Back in March, my wife and I adopted a rescue dog named Kita. At the time we thought she was an American Staffordshire Terrier, and she may well be, but we've heard from other experts that she is actually a pit bull. Whatever she is, she has been the source of a lot of joy in our home, but also a great deal of sadness.
I diaried about her adoption back in April. We wanted a shelter or rescue dog to find his or her "forever home" with us. When Kita turned out to be that dog, we were extremely excited. Here was this gorgeous dog with a lot of personality and energy, housebroken, who loved people.
Unfortunately, there was more to the story.
(Kita, shortly after we adopted her.)
We found Kita on petfinder.com, and learned she was in rescue with an outfit called Pound Pals in Radford, VA. Pound Pals had come to rescue her from a shelter, where she had been placed after being discovered chained to a fence at a puppy mill that had been raided. After a home visit from a DC-area rescue volunteer, and several phone calls and e-mails from Pound Pals, we learned that Kita was underweight, but otherwise healthy and non-aggressive, never having attacked humans or other animals. They did advise us that she had been attacked in the shelter once by another dog.
Now we're questioning whether Kita was attacked, or whether she was the aggressor. And we're even questioning whether they got her breed right, since other people we have seen have said she is actually an American Pit Bull Terrier, a generally more difficult breed to find a home for.
Over 4th of July weekend, while visiting my in-laws, my wife had gone out back to play fetch with Kita. My in-laws' neighbor had let her large mixed breed, Lucky, out into the backyard. Neither Lucky nor Kita get along particularly well with other dogs--Kita is the friendliest, sweetest dog to people, but she has some dog aggression issues. After hearing a scream, I ran to the back door to see that Kita was fighting with Lucky. Mrs. Sox and Lucky's owner were both screaming desperately at the dogs to break it up. I leaped over the fence in an attempt to get the dogs apart before they seriously hurt each other. It took some doing, and an injury to myself, but we did eventually separate the dogs. Thankfully, a neighbor had come over after hearing screaming, and helped me separate the two dogs again, and hustled Lucky into his house. My father-in-law got Kita back into his house.
After consulting with our dog trainer, we decided to give Kita another chance, since this was an encounter between two dog-aggressive rescue pets, and things have steadily improved. But last Sunday, we went to my parents' house to pick Kita up after she had stayed there while Mrs. Sox and I were out of town. We were loading our things into the car, including Kita (who my mother adores and was holding the leash of), when a couple walked by with their German shepherd. Like a switch going off, Kita suddenly bolted from my mom's grip and went to fight the other dog. Thankfully, we were able to separate them quickly, as Kita was wearing her choke chain, but not before both dogs got scraped up. We paid the vet bills for both animals, but this time the police were called, and we now have Kita under a ten day quarantine.
We simply don't know what to do. If we take her to the animal shelter and put her in the care of the city, we're fairly certain it's a foregone conclusion that she'll get euthanized. If we keep her, there's a pretty good chance that this happens again, no matter how much we spend on trainers, corrective collars, etc. I feel like I can't just sign her death warrant--we love this dog madly--but at the same time, we can't continue to have other dogs get injured by her, or risk the serious liability of a bully dog with an aggression history.
Anyone have any suggestions? This has really devastated us, and we want to do what is right--we just can't decide what that is.