Hard cull

So far I’ve only had to do it once. The first dog I ever owned was my Bulldog Thorn that I’ve posted on here before. I got him as a puppy and raised him as a house pet, I didn’t start hunting with dogs until he was 2 years old, then he became a really good RCD. He was always great with other dogs until I got my first two hunting pups.

He bonded with them and was always watching them. Well my cousin had a dog that was aggressive to males, and my wife was holding the first puppy one day while thorn was on one side of her and my cousins dog was on the other. The dog growled at thorn, and he thought it was growling at the puppy and they ended up going at it pretty good. Several months after that my cousin got two more dogs that were supposed to be hunting dogs that were surrendered at the pound, he doesn’t hunt, he just liked em. Well one was some type of hound/bulldog cross. He was a big long legged dog and was male aggressive. Him and the other dog both jumped on my bulldog in the yard one day and were stretching him out. I ran out there and beat them like they’ve prolly never been beat before... After that my bulldog was changed, he was very alert around other dogs and would always try to hit first if things started getting tense. He ended up almost killing that hound/pit dog a few months after that. If I hadn’t have seen it happen he would’ve killed him.

After that he was still good with the dogs that I raised around him from pups. Him and my old Dum Dum dog were best friends. When I was overseas my wife had them inside in crates. They both got out one night while she was at work and about killed each other. I though both of Dum Dum’s front legs were broke and thorns head was literally almost the size of a watermelon it was so swollen. After that I never let them around each other at the house, only while hunting.

I have kennels on the back corner of my house, and then further back past that I have a single chain that Thorn was on. My wife was complaining about having him on the chain so like an idiot I let her have her way and put him in my fenced in pool area. He ended up getting out and locked up with Dum Dum through his kennel and killed him. When I got home and realized what happened I put Thorn down. It was hard because there were multiple things over several years that led up to that, that were learning lessons for me and could have been avoided and potentially had none of this happen. After watching my security camera footage I also wonder if Thorn might have gotten rabies. The attack was unprovoked and he went back multiple times even after Dum Dum was dead. At first I thought a coyote or a stray might’ve done it, thorn was laying in a bundle of wheat straw about 20ft away when I got there so I didn’t see him at first. He never got up, never wagged his tail, or anything. I walked up to him and he just looked up at me for about 30 seconds with this look of sorrow, and then looked down right before I put him down. Idk if he understood what he had done and knew that there was no going back, if he was sorry about it, or what. I’ve never had a dog give me a look like that before and it gave me chills. That dog was like a son to me and used to go all over the place with me. That was the only time ever that I can think of where he didn’t immediately get excited or start wagging his tail and want to play when he saw me.

I still think about that situation all the time, losing both of those dogs in the same day ruined my team as well as they were my two favorite dogs. But I know it was a learning lesson and that I did what I had to. I vowed that day that I’ll never keep a dog on my yard that is aggressive like that again.

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