Tethering and the show Saturday

Saturday's show as expected was as controversial as everyone had been anticipating and attracted a large audience as well as some great callers. The idea to cover the topic of tethering initially came about after posting a picture on Facebook of Marty, I and his dog Choxie in her run. The picture in less than a day generated around 100 some comments. I had been helping out a friend do some work at his house and got a call in mid afternoon asking me " What the heck is going on, on your Facebook?". When I got home I got online to see what was going on with said picture. I was pretty disheartened to see Marty being portrayed as a bad owner because he has his dogs tethered. I know consistently you hear that "chained" dogs are responsible for a large number of reported bites when it comes to this breed, but after doing extensive research on the topic I could find no studies conclusively confirming these facts. It was quite the opposite the studies I was able to find indicated that proper tethering is not as harmful as repeatedly reported and that more bites occurred with dogs that were kept inside the home.

I myself do not tether my dogs not because I think it is inhumane but for the simple reason I do not have the yard space to do so. I do have to crate my dogs when I am not here which is widely accepted as a form of confinement for "responsible" owners, yet putting them out tethered conjures up images of terrible owners who neglect their dogs. While this may be true in many situations its not always the case and that is all I am trying to point out. Anti-Tethering laws ultimately affect even responsible owners just like BSL.

The laws we currently have in place people can't follow now and somehow people think enacting new laws will somehow make the problem magically disappear. Many "Animal Rights" organizations are also pushing for these laws and some of these same organizations would love to see the breed eradicated as a whole. Organizations who have publically stated that humans should not have companion animals yet people align themselves with them on bills like anti tethering?

In closing I don't think new laws are the answer to the problem, but harsher penalties for the people who break the laws we already have in place, once again just my opinion.