Animal Planet is a good show but they were wrong .

[AndyClyde]

I was watching Animal Planet the other day and I enjoy watching the pet police do there job. They showed a scene in New York City where someone had a dog that was not being looked after and when they arrived on the scene there was a dog just loaded with ticks.....it would make you sick to have seen the poor mutt. They did not say if they arrested the jerk that owned the dog or not.
Well...then they get another call that someone has some Game Roosters on the top of a auto garage/body shop and the pet police head straight over to the business and climb to the roof and sure enough there were probably 6 or so Game Roosters in cages.It is obvious they were not keeping these roosters just to hear them crow,but this is where the animal police proved they did not know much about Game Roosters.
They start confiscating these roosters and are commenting what the roosters were used for and how they were all going to have to be killed because they could not be introduced into chicken society on a farm.It annoyed me the animal police were going to kill these roosters out of ignorance.
The police were making comments on the roosters which indicated they were kept for fighting.
1.Fact: They said the roosters combs had been cut off for fighting purposes,this is done so the roosters fighting cannot grab each others combs.( some people do it for show as well..IE: 4 H projects)
2.Myth: They pointed to the natural spurs on there legs and said:this is more proof they are used for fighting,these spurs on there legs.Well my experience every rooster regardles off what breed of rooster has spurs on there legs.They should have said: the people that fight these roosters trim the natural spurs so the can place the artifical spurs on there legs( but these roosters spurs did not look like they had been trimmed recently.)
3.Myth: The animal police were placing these roosters in these cloth sacks and 1 of the animal police got a scratch on his arm and said:Look,this rooster is even trying to fight me now.....LOL any chicken you grab by the legs will try to scratch and claw and try to get away from you.
4.Myth: These roosters can not go to a farm because all they would do is try to fight the other chickens.
a. Some one might have taken one for a pet or a animal /roostercompanion and kept the thing in there back yard or went to a petting zoo instead of killing them.
b. I personally have game fowl and various breeds of chickens and they all run together,the oldest game rooster in my flock is the dominant one and I have other game roosters running loose and they never fight. A lot of my game stock came from a guy who fights roosters and he has about 2 hundred roosters tied out in a field and he give me a bunch of chicks and eggs and I raised my own game fowl along with my other chickens/Lakenvelders/Black Sumultra/Crested Polish/BuffOrpington...The guy that give me the Game Fowl cannot believe they are not fighting each other and I have had them 3 years.Any Rooster or hen becomes territorial,I can put any type of chicken/rooster or hen in a cage for a month or two in my back yard admidst my free range chickens for a couple of months and then turn the rooster out (or hen) and they will fight until the pecking order is established again,sometimes they will tear each other up if you do not watch them and intervene.

This is part of the problem I see with animal rights activists...they are misinformed.
I had a lady from town come out to my house and eventually she started talking to me about deer hunting...She asked me if I thought it was very sportsman like to chase the deer down with the 4 wheelers...I said lady, the 4 wheelers are used to transport the hunter to the woods and and to haul the deer out they harvest...etc .etc...

 

[cowboydoc]

<font color="red">This is part of the problem I see with animal rights activists...they are misinformed.
</font>

They sure are Andy!! I do not like cruelty but there are some things that are necessary. I went to the humane society to get some cats for our barn. You know they won't even let you adopt cats unless they are going to have a home in the house!!! You can't adopt a cat anymore that is going to be a barn cat. Unbelieveable. They won't let you adopt them for the barn but they will euthanize them. /forums/images/graemlins/shocked.gif

 

[Freds]

I lost me respect for animal planet when they came up with that show that theoretically pits animals against one another, such as a lion against a tiger or a rhino against an elephant. What next, a Jack (Parson) Russell Terrier against a Fox Terrier? I don't think so, but the whole concept of the program stinks in my opinion.

 

[NoTrespassing]

Yep Richard, There's a county humane society one county over from me that won't allow you to adopt a dog unless you keep it in the house at night. /forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gif /forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gif /forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gif
I have a word for those people... I call em whackjobs

Our local county humane society is a little more realistic. My wife adopted our dog Luna from the local one. That dog would much rather be outside most of the time.

Kevin

 

[AndyClyde]

There are plenty of free cats and dogs in the adds in the newspaper etc. no strings attatched...

 

[Alan L.]

Its amazing to me how many animals they "rescue" so they can hurry up and get them to the gas chamber.

 

[getut]

I had a very hard time finding our family dog. We wanted badly to adopt a male black lab, but no one would let us without agreeing to neuter. I tried to explain to people that we had no intention of breeding the dog, but I wanted a male with lots of energy to wear the kids out and have good instinct to be a squirrel dog. The males are usually MUCH harder to train, but when you do get them trained, whoa nelly, you've usually got a good one.

Spaying a female, I agree has no negative side effects and the positive of not increasing the population. Neutering a male drastically changes their behavior and I simply did not want that.

They would rather put them to sleep.

 

[EddieWalker]

I enjoy the animals shows for the pictures, but when they start to mention hunting or get political, I usually change the channel.

Hunters are responsible for preserving the wildlife in this country and the world. They are responsible for the re-introdcution of species to habitat and regions that haven't seen them for decades.

One of my favorite PETA stories was a few years ago. They decided to adopt all the dogs at the local shelters and find homes for them. After a few months of paying for the food bills and sheltering all these animals, without finding homes for them, they realized they were loseing money.

The solution they came up with was to put to sleep over a thousand dogs that they were gonna save. To be honest, I don't know if those dogs would have found homes at the shelters or been put to sleep anyway.

 

[PitbullMidwest]

I once heard a story (probably an urban legand) about PETA opening a no kill shelter in a small town and at the same time causing a fuss over hog confinements in the same area. Well, as the story goes, a local farmer hauls one of his biggest boars into town, opens the front door of the shelter and herds him in.

PETA is so freightened by the angry hog (and for good reason) they have to call the sheriff who comes and in great irony shoots the hog at their no kill shelter. The next day the shelter closes.

The no kill shelter in our area is usually at capacity and is strick about where the animal can be placed. When I looked at a German shorthair and told them it would be an outdoor dog I was told the dog needed a better quality of life then that and wouldn't let me adopt. I stood there looking at the 4x8 kennel he was in trying to figure out how his current quality of life was preferable to running loose on the farm but some things just can't be understood.

 

[MossRoad]

I'll have to say that the shelters around here like to err on the side of caution. They get most cats from rotten conditions and want to ensure that it is not going back to a rotten condition to re-produce more animals that are not wanted. So I give them an A+ for spaying and neutering ALL animals that leave through their doors.

As for inside cat VS outside cat, although I agree that there should be a distinction between working cat VS house cat, I don't think the animal shelter will be adopting out worknig cats anytime soon. I've read that the average lifespan of a cat that is let outdoors even occasionally is about 1/4 that of a cat that is kept indoors. So, again, the shelters are going to err on the side of caution. To get a working cat for your barn, just check other farmers. They'll probably have one around that has been trained to be a good mouser by its momma. Every house cat that I've ever had was good at playing hockey with mice, but did not know how to kill it. They just kind of scare it to death while batting it around for a good long while.

Having just buried my best buddy for the last 17 years last week, we've made the decision to get two more kittens in a few months from one of the local shelters. The people that run those places are indeed, kind of looney. You'd have to be to take in 20-30 cats and keep them until you found a home for them that treats them the way you want them treated. They're flipping the bill for their care and upkeep at the no kill shelters through donations, so they get to decide who gets the cat. The Humane Society gets donations and some tax money through contracts with local municipalities. In general, I believe they are doing as good a job as they can and only have the best interest of the animals at heart, while trying to do the most with the financing they have. Hard decisions have to be made.

I'm sure you would treat a working cat well, by keeping it up to date on shots, spayed, neutered, clean and fed, etc... probably even the ocassional scratch behind the ears. A good life for a cat, indeed. I just don't think you're going to get that cat from a shelter.