Okay I have to chime in here,I HATE the bad rap the pit bulls get,there are a lot of towns that have banned them around here,it is not the dogs fault it is the way they are raised,I know some people use these dogs as fighters but again that is people not the dogs.My son got me a dog from a shelter 6 years ago,a pit bull,bless her heart she has saved my life twice,really saved my life had it not been for her I would have died 5 years ago,I was in a boating accident,the prop got my leg,all but cut it off,I was knocked out Tootie my hero who had also been thrown from the boat,found me when I surfaced,I came to enough to know she was there she swam back to the capsized boat with me hanging on to her colar,I held on to the boat till help got there,when the rescue squad first got there they could not even get a bp reading and pulse rate was 22,I had almost bled out,after a 4 month stay in the hospital,I went home for a week,I developed a bad infection in the leg,went back to the hospital,they had to debre my leg,meaning they had to cut away the flesh where it had turned black,and started the healing process all over,6 more months on a wound vac,still praying I wasn't gonna lose my leg,and now 5 years later,I still have my leg and my hero,Tootie.My son says that is the best 50.00 dollars he has ever spent,and she loves the grand babies,if they take a nap Tootie lays beside them until they wake up,and while they are sleeping,no one and, I mean no one bothers those babies.I am sorry I started to ramble but it really bothers me that people judge a dog by the breed,and that is so unfair,Okay I will hush about all this,love you guys,Happy New Year. Bonnie

i was disappointed because i wanted to share in the joy but could no longer link to the threads 'cuz there were gone - so i'm all for starting new ones... i love the dog story - i have three dogs so i can somewhat relate - although we dont have elks here - we do have funny dog stories... our dog tried to re-upholster our couch with strips of sod ... i had rented a sod cutter and removed sod from a new garden bed and placed the strips along the fence line in the back yard. i watered the newly laid sod really well in order to get it to take root. while i was at work the next day, my dh was sleeping in the recliner and our dog piece by piece brought the strips of sod into the house, through the doggie door, down the steps, into the family room and spread them out on to our couch. many pieces had broken and were spread out all over the floor - many other pieces were strewn about the couch - ground in - they were nice and damp and very muddy - seeing how i had really watered them too .... not quite sure what the dog thought she was doing -she must have spent at least 20-30 minutes or more making trips back and forth from the fence to the house and back again - draggin sod into the house -

I am sorry that you lost Angel, alisande, and also my apologies for not noting the date on your post. I am sure your dog loved her home and don't doubt that you cared for her and treated her well in all other respects. However I stand by my statement that it is cruel to confine any animal for more than 4 hours without provisions for relieving himself. I am not condemning you for having to work long hours to provide for your family; rather I offered several constructive suggestions to provide a pet with potty facilities when an owner must be gone for long hours. I would add another suggestion of confining the pet to a room with linoleum or tile flooring and providing pee pads. Perhaps other readers might find these alternatives to making a pet 'hold it' for long hours helpful, and another confined pet might benefit. 'Holding it' for long periods of time is unhealthy as well as psychologically upsetting to a housetrained dog.

Oh no. I agree with the poster who mentioned that anyone that would stop and take a dog does NOT have good motives in mind. A true lover of animals would stop their car and catch the dog and immediately start knocking on doors, looking to reunite the animal with its owner. We currently have a problem in our area with people taking dogs for the dog fighting rings, they also go on sites like craiglist and pass themselves off as a family looking for a pet, more than happy to take your "free to good home" animal off your hands. They will even PAY THE ADOPTION FEE that some people ask, as long as it doesn't cut into their "profit" when they sell the animal to the dog fighting rings. It is a sad, sad world until people get together and DEMAND from our friends the politicians stricter laws against animal cruelty in all forms. For your sake, and the sake of your poor dog, I really hope that it WAS an animal lover who took her. Keep looking, go to shelters in person, hang posters everywhere....offer a reward. Pray. I will pray for you too, that your little one makes it home safe... And for everyone who lets their dogs out without supervision, or if your dog is good at shooting by you when you open the front door, be careful. This is NOT a nice world we live in, regardless of what we want to believe.