Back in September, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced his plan to ban the XL bully dog in the UK. This came after several horrific incidents were reported, some caught on video, of XL bullies getting into deadly fights with other dogs and humans, including children. Tensions were running high from all sides. Victims of the scary incidents experienced trauma, and owners of non-violent XL bullies were distressed about the fate of their pets. Well, Sunak made good on his promise of a ban. XL bully owners had until February 1 to register their dogs for an exemption certificate that would allow the owner to keep their dog under several protective conditions. It’s been estimated that upwards of 30,000 XL bullies were registered by the deadline. Police can now seize any unregistered XL bullies to have them euthanized, and the pet owners face fines and prison time. The BBC has had lots of coverage this week as the deadline came and went:
The RSPCA doesn’t support the ban: But Dr Sam Gaines, a dog welfare expert for the RSPCA, said the organisation did not want the XL bully to be added to the banned list. She said it would rather see a clampdown on irresponsible breeding, and targeting of individual dogs and owners putting people at risk through their behaviour. … Dr Gaines said: “There are definitely going to be owners of XL bullies who will have not gone through the exemption process and obviously that is a concern. This is why we need to make sure resources are focused on individuals who are deliberately keeping dogs because they want to threaten people with them, frighten people and intimidate them.”
Owners can get monetary compensation for putting their dogs down: When the ban was announced the government launched a compensation scheme for XL bully owners to have their dogs put down. People are eligible to receive £200 if they paid for the euthanasia or £100 if they used a free charity service. Figures released under Freedom of Information laws show 117 compensation claims had been received as of 8 January, with £13,600 paid out.
The rules for keeping XL bullies: Owners registering to keep their XL bully must comply with restrictions to ensure they are not a danger to the public. The dogs must be microchipped, kept on a lead, muzzled in public and neutered to ensure they cannot continue breeding.
Ellee Keegan on registering her dog Costa: “It felt daunting to think that my dog is now a number on a dangerous dogs list.” After registering Costa, Ms Keegan was also required to fit him with a muzzle when out on walks. “It is heart-breaking,” Ms Keegan said, “because he is a big dog and big dogs need a lot of exercise. He plays with sticks and balls, and now he does not understand why he can’t.”
Trainer Steve Constantinou owns three XL bullies: “Mandatory training should be a must and a dog licence is the way forward,” he said. “All that will happen now is the irresponsible dog owners will move on to the next breed and this will be the Cane Corso or Presa Canario, which are larger breeds than the XL bully and more issues will arise.”
This is just miserable all around, and I can’t help but feel that the core of all the problems here are humans, not dogs. When we talked about the French Bulldog being America’s new favorite breed, many of you noted in the comments that their health problems stem from us breeding them to our preferences. Same story here, accent on different features. The XL bully came from people breeding American Pitbulls with American Staffordshire Terriers. They have the potential to inflict the most damage, and they are more likely to inflict that damage when in the care of irresponsible human owners. We ruin everything! But none of that understanding really helps with practical solutions to dealing with violent dog attacks happening now. The victims deserve justice, and at the same time I feel for the responsible dog owners.
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This breaks my heart. I have a pittie mix that I adopted over Covid. She’s a pain in my butt but I love her immensely. She’s smart, strong, and goofy. She’s not mean but she is protective. It’s a shame that there are bad owners out there who have helped make the perception that a whole breed is dangerous.
I live in Ireland and sadly many of these dogs will be dumped here where are rules are more relaxed. There is also a lot of puppy mills here and the dogs get trafficked to the UK. So distressing and unethical. These people should go to jail imo
This might catch the neglectful owner. But it isn’t going to stop dog abuse or attacks. Dogs aren’t the problem. Dog owners, trainers, breeders, are the problem. People are the ones who should be educated and licensed.
Realistically though the vast, vast majority of people in England who own these dogs are people wanting a dog that looks threatening, and not for reasons of personal safety. There’s a huge class factor involved in all of this which the press aren’t mentioning.
I have a bully breed dog who is the love of my life, which is why it breaks my heart thinking about all the bullies who languish in shelters because of irresponsible owners and endless housing bans. I fully support bans on breeding bully breeds. I don’t support bringing these intelligent, sensitive, loving creatures into the world to be abused or neglected. I am horrified at compelling people to euthanize these beautiful creatures, though. That is not the answer.
ITA – Just the thought of someone putting down a pet because of what thoughtless humans have done to OTHER dogs makes me soul sick. It’s not the dog’s fault. Horrible!
From the get-go, I trained our American Staffordshire (AmStaff) Terrier to “get dressed for the party” and wear a muzzle. We’d be out walking in an off-leash park and folks would say: if you trained your dog properly, you’d never need a muzzle. I’d say okay, remove the muzzle and carry on till we met the next person: That’s a dangerous dog and should always be muzzled. So I’d say okay, call Dubz to me and muzzle him. Because he’d been introduced to the muzzle properly, he had no fear of it. When wearing it, he was proud and comfortable being “dressed for the party”. When unmuzzled, he was happy to just be.
PEOPLE wore me down. When Dubz passed, I decided I didn’t want another “bully” breed simply because PEOPLE were exhausting, invasive, rude and ignorant. My dog was none of those things.
That said, ALL DOGS SHOULD BE TRAINED TO WEAR A MUZZLE HAPPILY AND COMFORTABLY. In case of emergency, a dog must be muzzled to enter an evac centre or for a vet to safely complete a procedure, etc. Fear/pain can affect any dog’s reaction to an unfamiliar or scary circumstance. Better safe than sorry, eh?!
The guy who created this breed, American Bully, was involved in illegal dog fighting as a teenager. He was arrested and sent to Juvenile detention; and when he got out he decided to create a breed of dog that looked fierce but was a totally non aggressive sweetheart of a dog. His aim was to get kids out of dog fighting and into training and showing the dogs. It worked. It’s a total shame that this breed is now considered a “dangerous” dog. It is not their nature at all. I’ve had two bullies and they are the loveliest and sweetest dogs. They love kids, are friendly to other dogs, and absolutely adapt their play to the person they are playing with. It is completely the owner’s fault if a dog is aggressive.
This seems so poorly thought out. It’s inhumane to euthanize healthy animals that haven’t individually displayed any aggressive behaviors. They should have been grandfathered in. Requiring them all to be registered, chipped, and leashed is entirely reasonable. This is both cruel and ineffective in the goal of reducing the total number of dog attacks.
Dogs as a species exist at all because of what humans did to wolves over the course of millennia. Accidental and careless breeding happens all the time, but the majority of breeding by domesticated animals happens under human control. We put all of those traits into each breed. Dogs are the product of collective human action. Some people are going to misuse dogs just like we misuse everything else that falls into our hands. They need to stop wasting time and resources playing whack-a-mole with individual breed bans. Work on a regulatory framework that will address the breeding of aggressive and exotic animals of all kinds.
Personally I can’t understand why anyone would get such a potentially aggressive dog that is specifically bred to look dangerous, unless their intention is to intimidate. If you just wanted a cuddly good natured companion, you’d choose a breed which has been bred for that purpose.