November 26th 2011 8:32 pm
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Something terrible and scary happened yesterday! My friend Poochini was out with her mom taking their morning walk and a pit bull rushed out of a back yard and attacked her! Her mom tried to pull her up out of the way but the pit bull latched onto her front leg and ripped at it. Fortunately the owner was able to get the dog to release Poochini from its grip and a passerby took Poochini and her mom to the vet in his car. At the vet, they rushed her in and hooked her up to an IV to stabilize her until they could assess the damage. Then her mom called my mom and we rushed over there. We had to wait for hours to find out how bad the wounds were and if Poochini would be all right. Poochini is a yorkie-poo and weighs less than five pounds, so we were all worried that she wouldn't survive this attack. When the vet finally came out to tell us the outcome this is what she said: The bite extended from her chest underneath and around the front leg and back up to her shoulder - the leg was almost ripped off. The lung wasn't punctured which was good, but the muscle was severely damaged and a bundle of nerves was exposed. The bone wasn't broken but only a strip of skin on the front of the leg was holding it on. The vet had to piece together the muscle and skin and stitch it up. She tried to clean it out as much as possible, but so much hair and matter had been chewed into the mangled flesh that it was impossible to clean it all out.

Poochini will live, but it's not certain that she will recover the full use of her leg and we have to wait and see if there will be nerve damage. Hopefully there won't be any infection. She'll have to go back to the vet quite a few times. The owners were stand-up people and are doing the right thing about paying the bills and they are very apologetic, which makes things a little easier for Poochini's mom. But there will be difficult days ahead.

When will people realize that pit bulls are dangerous dogs? All you pit bull fans can say whatever you want, but these dogs were bred to fight and kill, and as mellow as they might seem around family, they are dog-agressive. They are hard-wired to attack what they view as prey and can do so unexpectedly, and when they do there will be disastrous results. Their muscular jaws exert a vice-like grip that can't be broken once their instinct is engaged. Their unpredictability is what makes them so dangerous because no one knows what will set them off. People who own high prey-drive dogs need to ensure that their dogs are ALWAYS under their PHYSICAL control and/or muzzled, and they (the owners) should be educated about properly socializing their dog.