Dogs, Badass or Otherwise

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Guinness, who we rescued 7 years ago to the day had to be put down today. No idea how old he really was but easily 10+ for sure. Amazing alpha dog. Never made a wrong step. A leader. Was living in an unheated shipping container with his 2 brothers. Farmer was going to shoot them all. Took him and his brother Ben and the third brother Bear went to someone else.

I'm shattered.
So sorry for your loss
 
View attachment 10595
Guinness, who we rescued 7 years ago to the day had to be put down today. No idea how old he really was but easily 10+ for sure. Amazing alpha dog. Never made a wrong step. A leader. Was living in an unheated shipping container with his 2 brothers. Farmer was going to shoot them all. Took him and his brother Ben and the third brother Bear went to someone else.

I'm shattered.
Very sorry for your loss. It's always so hard to lose a member of the family. RIP Guiness.
 
With great sadness, I have to report that I had to have my glorious all-black Tosa, Cyrus, put down on Monday. He only started manifesting symptoms of ill health over the weekend. It turns out he was afflicted with something called Evan's Syndrome, which is a perfect storm of two separate blood ailments. Each is potentially lethal and the combination has been described as "dire." Really, euthanasia was the only option. In my life I have owned eight dogs, five of them Tosas. Of all of them, he was the best--an exceptionally bonded and joyful dog. He will be sorely missed by me and my family. Not sure I will ever get another dog. I am sick of having my heart torn out so often!
 
With great sadness, I have to report that I had to have my glorious all-black Tosa, Cyrus, put down on Monday. He only started manifesting symptoms of ill health over the weekend. It turns out he was afflicted with something called Evan's Syndrome, which is a perfect storm of two separate blood ailments. Each is potentially lethal and the combination has been described as "dire." Really, euthanasia was the only option. In my life I have owned eight dogs, five of them Tosas. Of all of them, he was the best--an exceptionally bonded and joyful dog. He will be sorely missed by me and my family. Not sure I will ever get another dog. I am sick of having my heart torn out so often!

Jan, please accept my sincere condolences for your loss
 
Jan, please accept my sincere condolences for your loss
Thanks, Thruth. Appreciate the sentiment, and I would like to reciprocate the feeling about your boy. At least he lived about 10 years, which is a good run for big dog. From the photo he looks like a Newfoundland. Is that right?
 
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With great sadness, I have to report that I had to have my glorious all-black Tosa, Cyrus, put down on Monday. He only started manifesting symptoms of ill health over the weekend. It turns out he was afflicted with something called Evan's Syndrome, which is a perfect storm of two separate blood ailments. Each is potentially lethal and the combination has been described as "dire." Really, euthanasia was the only option. In my life I have owned eight dogs, five of them Tosas. Of all of them, he was the best--an exceptionally bonded and joyful dog. He will be sorely missed by me and my family. Not sure I will ever get another dog. I am sick of having my heart torn out so often!
Shit, Jan, I'm so so sorry to hear that. I know you loved that dog like he was a child. My condolences to you and your family.
 
^Thanks also, Rambo. Yes, I did love that dog intensely, probably too much for my own good. I can remember back in 1998, when we had two Tosas and a Standard Poodle, my wife remarked, "It's dangerous to love these dogs as much as we do." Within a few days, my magnificent brindle male Tosa, Zuma, was dead from bloat. He was 3 years and 20 days old.

Yes, I am feeling a lot of pain and grief, but I can't imagine it being comparable to the loss of a child. You don't have a child with the firm expectation that you will outlive the child, and you know it's not remotely likely that you will have to decree your child's death, as I had to do with Cyrus and three of my four other Tosas, Zuma having been the exception: He died after surgery for bloat.
 
Sorry to hear about your dog, Jan. I've never heard of a Tosa before tonight and what a fine looking kind of dog they are.
 
Jan and Thruth, I'm so sorry to hear this.

My dog's getting old; it'll be his time soon. He's only 8 but he's covered in scars (undisputed dog park wrestling champion, plus a coyote fight and a couple of raccoons) his hips are going, he's had a knee replaced, he's had three surgeries for foreign body ingestion, he's losing his eyesight, and we nearly had to put him down last summer with a drug-resistant ear infection that left him deaf in one ear. What a ride, though. What a character. He's asleep beside my desk right now as I type this. Best goddamn dog I've ever had.

I think it's good to get attached.

My wife and I don't have kids. Instead, we have a 130-lb mildly retarded bulldog but man, he is a force of nature and a personality to be reckoned with. He's needlessly brave, literally afraid of nothing, obedient, consistent (it helps that he's retarded), and suicidally devoted to my wife. He's family by any definition that matters.

I don't believe you can love a dog too much, because no matter how much we love our dogs, it still doesn't hold a candle to how hard they love us. When they're here they're such a huge presence, and when they're gone, they leave a huge hole. But I think that's okay because that way, it all balances out.

I'm sorry for your loss.
 
Jan and Thruth, I'm so sorry to hear this.

My dog's getting old; it'll be his time soon. He's only 8 but he's covered in scars (undisputed dog park wrestling champion, plus a coyote fight and a couple of raccoons) his hips are going, he's had a knee replaced, he's had three surgeries for foreign body ingestion, he's losing his eyesight, and we nearly had to put him down last summer with a drug-resistant ear infection that left him deaf in one ear. What a ride, though. What a character. He's asleep beside my desk right now as I type this. Best goddamn dog I've ever had.

I think it's good to get attached.

My wife and I don't have kids. Instead, we have a 130-lb mildly retarded bulldog but man, he is a force of nature and a personality to be reckoned with. He's needlessly brave, literally afraid of nothing, obedient, consistent (it helps that he's retarded), and suicidally devoted to my wife. He's family by any definition that matters.

I don't believe you can love a dog too much, because no matter how much we love our dogs, it still doesn't hold a candle to how hard they love us. When they're here they're such a huge presence, and when they're gone, they leave a huge hole. But I think that's okay because that way, it all balances out.

I'm sorry for your loss.
If I could cry I think this would have done it.
 
Thank you for your condolences, Rain Man, and sorry to hear your big boy is going into such a decline. Before I got into the Tosas, I considered the AB. At 130-pounds, I assume your dog is largely or entirely Johnson lines. I know of one couple who for years would keep a female Tosa with a male AB. They went through several generations of such pairings. The Tosa was always dominant, but they greatly esteemed the AB breed.
 
I know this is rather trivial Jan Libourel Jan Libourel , but if you watch the show Manhattan they reference the island of Tosa and the dogs there in one of the episodes this season. I forgot to mention how it made me think of you and your dogs since I never would have had a single clue about them if it weren't for you.
 
Before I got into the Tosas, I considered the AB. At 130-pounds, I assume your dog is largely or entirely Johnson lines.

He's a hybrid but he has an enormous barrel chest. He doesn't have the big Johnson head.

Tor Katie Beach.jpg


Had I known how much trouble he was going to be, I would have gone with another breed, and I don't recommend AB's to anybody. He was difficult to train, stubborn, powerful, dominant, and fuckin' stupid.

How stupid?

When you give a Doberman a command, he snaps to it. Wham.

Give my dog a command, and it takes a few seconds. I swear to God you can see the hamster push the ball down the chute, knocking over the dominoes, lighting the match that burns the string and releases the balloon that pops on the ceiling with the answer. "Oh! Right! SIT!!"

Years of training.

Fuckin'. Stupid.

One trainer suggested that there might have been low oxygen during birth. He can't stack commands. He can't SIT and STAY. He knows STAY, but he'll stand up and STAY if he was sitting and you say STAY; to him, STAY is apparently "Remain Behind This Invisible Line."

If you throw a ball at him it will bounce off his head. Roll it past him and he'll watch it. Tell him to GET IT, he's all over it. Tell him to COME with the ball, he'll drop it and COME. There's just not enough processing power in there to do two things simultaneously. We learned to work with it.

We gave him the blanket IQ test, where you throw a blanket over his head and time him to see how long until he gets out of it. He did nothing. Shit, he'd still be there today if we hadn't taken the blanket off him.

But after all the training, the daily drills, the heartbreak of having to leave the dogpark so many times when another dog takes it personally that he plays so hard (with an AB you're always the bad parent), and learning to speak Hodor Dog, he's still the best damned dog I've ever had.

I'll never get another AB. We're already thinking of the Next Dog and we're thinking to size it down a notch and go with one of the newer Olde English Bulldogges, where they've bred some of the faults out and basically made a smaller AB. I love the bully breeds (hate the whole "Ambully" gangsterpussy shortpenis fuckwittery), but next time I want a little less dog.

Some American Indian tribes believe that a pet that truly bonds with you is a vehicle for your spirit guide, and they may return to you over and over during your life. If that's true, he liked being a bulldog this time. We'll do it again.
 
I know this is rather trivial Jan Libourel Jan Libourel , but if you watch the show Manhattan they reference the island of Tosa and the dogs there in one of the episodes this season. I forgot to mention how it made me think of you and your dogs since I never would have had a single clue about them if it weren't for you.

Actually, "Tosa" is not an island. The island is Shikoku, the smallest of the four Home Islands of Japan. There is a gulf, the Tosa Wan, bordering the island and Tosa Prefecture that gives the breed its name. Kochi is a major city on the island. There is a Tosa Dogfighting Center there that is the premier tourist attraction in the city. Until very recently, they staged short (five minute) exhibition fights several times a day, but in the past couple of years this practice has been halted. Can you remember anything more about what was said on the show about the dogs?
 
Actually, "Tosa" is not an island. The island is Shikoku, the smallest of the four Home Islands of Japan. There is a gulf, the Tosa Wan, bordering the island and Tosa Prefecture that gives the breed its name. Kochi is a major city on the island. There is a Tosa Dogfighting Center there that is the premier tourist attraction in the city. Until very recently, they staged short (five minute) exhibition fights several times a day, but in the past couple of years this practice has been halted. Can you remember anything more about what was said on the show about the dogs?
I meant to type island of Tosas, in reference to the island/area where the dogs are from. The episode of Manhattan is titled 'Fatherland' if you get the WGN network in your cable package you might be able to catch a rerun. The short version is they have an internment camp prison where they stick two prisoners in an empty prison (the prison is nicknamed Tosa) and let them fight until one wins. If no one fights, they "heat up the cage", like they apparently do with Tosas when they want to get them to fight.
 
Until very recently, they staged short (five minute) exhibition fights several times a day, but in the past couple of years this practice has been halted.

Funny story: we had to stop hosting playdates over at our house. Tor (our AB, "Ator L'Invincibile" and yes, we named him after an Italian Conan the Barbarian ripoff, don't judge me) had a playmate who was a female Great Dane, and another who was a female Bull Terrier, which if you haven't seen one, imagine a bag of concrete crossed with an anteater and wearing a jetpack. We have 2 acres so we had play dates at our house. They played that chase-box-wrestle game that Bully breeds play, full contact of course, and together they would shake the gates of Heaven. They once dented my truck. Of course, we'd all sit around on the patio with beers and cheer them on. Sometimes they'd get a little dinged up, the occasional blood, but no harm, no foul.

And then my fuckstick neighbor called the sheriff and reported us as running a dogfighting ring. Oh, boy.

The deputy who showed up owned an 18-month-old Bullmastiff. He understood exactly what we were doing but suggested we not do it anymore because my neighbor had been calling them for weeks and they finally sent a car out just to shut him up. It would be easier for everyone involved if we just took it to the park, which is how Tor became the legend he is today.

Anyway. As I said, we don't have kids. I could tell dog stories for days.
 
I meant to type island of Tosas, in reference to the island/area where the dogs are from. The episode of Manhattan is titled 'Fatherland' if you get the WGN network in your cable package you might be able to catch a rerun. The short version is they have an internment camp prison where they stick two prisoners in an empty prison (the prison is nicknamed Tosa) and let them fight until one wins. If no one fights, they "heat up the cage", like they apparently do with Tosas when they want to get them to fight.

"Heat up the cage"???!!! I have never heard of such a thing. Any Tosa worthy of his dog food should be ready to fly at any dog of the same sex that presents a challenge. If Tosas were unwilling to fight, they would be disqualified (and probably put down by their owners).
 
After making the previous post, it occurred to me that I thought most fighting octagons were made of wood. I checked up on this, and so they were or, less commonly, with wood frames holding metal pipes as bars. How you could heat a wooden octagon up enough to agitate the dogs without burning the whole thing down eludes me. I wonder who comes up with this stuff. The irony is that whoever does is in all probability making a helluva lot more money than I ever did!
 
We're in the middle of a huge thunderstorm right now. Every time there's thunder, Tor barks and growls at it. If I let him out into the yard after a thunderclap, he'll bark at the sky with his hackles up. I know it's because he's too stupid to be afraid of anything, but I've still got to admire anyone who bares his teeth at God.
 
We're in the middle of a huge thunderstorm right now. Every time there's thunder, Tor barks and growls at it. If I let him out into the yard after a thunderclap, he'll bark at the sky with his hackles up. I know it's because he's too stupid to be afraid of anything, but I've still got to admire anyone who bares his teeth at God.

My Bull Mastif loves the sky & seems to stair at the clouds. She digs airplanes when they fly over but hates hot air balloons. Go figure
 

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