Best Friends Animal Society, the website for the nation’s largest no-kill animal sanctuary featured in the former National Geographic TV series Dogtown, announced June 27 its efforts to help pit-bull type dogs are gaining traction.

Shelter Partners for Pit Bulls aims to decrease shelter euthanasia rates for pit-bull-terrier-type dogs, increase the number of pit-bull-terrier-type adoptions and positive outcomes, and redeem the image of pit-bull-terrier-type dogs in local communities.

The group started with five pilot communities: Cucamonga, Calif.; Baltimore; Washington, D.C.; Tampa, Fla.; and San Diego, Calif. PetSmart Charities granted the effort $240,000 along with additional support from Best Friends.

The result has been an increase in adoptions and happier dogs.

To further these efforts, Chrissie’s Fund recently provided a $20,000 donation to the two California Shelter Partners for Pit Bulls. Later this year, each shelter will receive $2,000 to buy enrichment toys for the shelter’s pit bull-type dogs and $8,000 to fund their upcoming Neighborhood Pit Bull Days.

Love-A-Bull is in the process of organizing its own celebration for National Pit Bull Awareness Day.

The Texas-Sized Pittie Pride Parade & Festival will include vendors, non-profit information booths, celebrities and a downtown parade that will attempt to set the world record for the most pit bulls in one location. Join the festivities 11:30 a.m. Nov. 6 at the south end of Congress Avenue Bridge, 305 S. Congress Ave., Austin.

Tagged: advocacy, dog, national pit bull awareness day, pit bullFiled under: Uncategorized

Amy and Rod Burkert of GoPetFriendly.com posted an article on StubbyDog describing what prompted them to found the website for people who want to travel with their pet.

Visitors can plan a road trip, find accommodations at hotels or campgrounds and pick from restaurants, services and activities that are pet friendly.

A destination guide lists activities by state, with three entries for Texas, including A Day in Austin with the Dogs.

Stay up to date with Take Paws, the Go Pet Friendly blog, and learn tricks for how to travel with pets in the tips & resources section. Visitors are encouraged to comment and add listings to the pet friendly database.

The couple travels with Ty, a 35-pound Shar Pei therapy dog, and Buster, a 75-pound German Shepherd—the fourth most restricted dog breed, behind Pit Bulls, Rottweilers and Dobermans.

They recently spent 10 months traveling more than 27,000 miles through 30 states and two Canadian provinces.

Honestly, we don’t feel we’ve made any gut-wrenching sacrifices to travel with Ty and Buster. A goal of GoPetFriendly.com is to connect pet lovers with businesses and service providers that will help make their travel experiences with their furry friends exceptional. Why? Because we believe that if it is easier for people to travel with their pet, more pets will get to go on vacation, and that will encourage more businesses to “Go Pet Friendly.”

Tagged: advocacy, community, dog, restricted dog breed, therapy dog, travel, websiteFiled under: Uncategorized

Love-A-Bull and all the Pit Bull Task Force partners worked together for an amazing successful campaign to help spay and neuter some great dogs. The project was so successful, appointments filled right up and more were being made into the next month!

Emancipet shared some of the wonderful feedback received from the beneficiaries.

“Well what can I say? How about — WOW!! Thank you so very much for allowing this great service. I brought four 3 month old pit puppies, and the generosity allowed me to get the spay & neuter free of charge Although I am gong to be looking for homes for the puppies, I know that the dogs being fixed and up to date on their shots will allow me to find them their forever homes more easily. Again, a great big THANKS!” -Daniel B.
 
“Pipken is a foster looking for a fantastic home. I brought her here to get spayed, so what happened to her doesn’t happen again with more pups. She is very loving and will truly appreciate what you’ve done for her. Thank you.”
 
“Thank you so very much, Love-A-Bull! Princess & Rufus send lots of wet kisses!” – Glenda, Christopher, Princess, and Rufus
 
“Thank you for the special for pit-bulls. We appreciate the help and the service.” -Humberto and King
 
“Coco and I will like to thank Emancipet and ALL of their partners for providing us with such great services! You have made the life of my little pit more happy and healthy.” -Omar and Coco
 
“I took Max to Emancipet for the Pit Stop special and I couldn’t be more thankful! I love my dog more than anything and he’s special to me. I only want the best for him and I really appreciate that someone wants the same.” -Audrey
 
“Came with my daughter to get our family dog (Max-Pit Bull) to get the Pit Stop special. It’s so wonderful, because otherwise we could not have afforded to do this. He got out of yard and we thought we had lost him because there was a female dog in heat- so now we will NEVER have to worry about taht again and I’m sooo greatful because Max is a big part of our family.” -Trish

AND some of the adorable pictures! Man, our pit bulls and their owners can sure ham it up!

Filed under: Uncategorized

Lady, featured in Portland's Bully Walk

We would like to share an email that we received from The Portland Pit Bull Project, who sponsor a monthly walk they call Bully Walk. They have encouraged rescue groups and shelters in Portland to bring adoptable pitties along on their monthly walk. Their hope is that by providing some visibility to dogs in need of adoption, they can help those dogs find homes sooner. It is great to hear about successful pit bull advocacy programs in other cities!

We, The Portland Pit Bull Project, sponsors of the monthly Bully Walk wanted to share some very exciting news. We have been trying to encourage rescues, shelters and fosters to come walk with us in an effort to provide more exposure for those pit bulls available for adoption. One of our goals as a pit bull advocacy group is to assist in any way that we can in finding good responsible homes for pit bulls in need of one. We are not a rescue not do we intend to become one but we do endeavor to facilitate pit bull adoptions to responsible homes through our monthly Bully Walks as well as our website and facebook pages.

We are very pleased to announce our very first assist to an adoption. A foster brought her charge, Lady, to our bully walk last Sunday for our June walk. Lady (photo attached) is an adorable, happy, affectionate and pudgy pit bull (I’m guessing she’s a mix) who seemed to have an issue with the other dogs. Our resident dog behaviorist/people trainer Dave Genisman immediately offered to work with Lady who took his lead well and settled down around the other dogs easily. The ‘power of the pack’ took over once we started walking and Lady was in her element completely forgetting to be aggressive toward her fellow pit bulls. As a result of her exposure to the many other pit bull lovers participating in the walk we are pleased to announce that Lady has been adopted and is now in a forever home with people who have pit bull experience. We hope to see Lady on our monthly walks as she becomes a part of her new forever family.

We also had another pit bull named Miles in attendance who was in need of a forever home. At least one person visiting our Facebook page, where we posted the information about Lady and Miles, looks to be interested in him. Hopefully we’ll have another success story to share soon…

We couldn’t be more pleased to know that we played even a small part in helping a pit bull in need of a home connect with someone who will provide a happy balanced home for them. We hope to have many, many future success stories to share.

We can be found on line at the following places:
The Portland Pit Bull Project
PDX Pit Bulls (blog)
The Portland Pit Bull Parade (Facebook)

Regards,
Cheryl Huerta
The Portland Pit Bull Project
We promote responsible dog ownership

P.S. Speaking of monthly walks, our next monthly fun walk is coming up on Sunday, June 19th. What a great way to spend Father’s Day! We hope to see you there!

Tagged: bully walk, the portland pit bull projectFiled under: Uncategorized

A report containing flawed data about dog bites was recently published by Dr. John Bini of San Antonio’s University Hospital. Sadly, this seems to have been unnoticed since it was published. His bogus “study” is exactly the kind of negative propaganda that damages the reputation of pit bull type dogs and hurts the responsible owners who work hard everyday to combat mass-distributed misinformation like his.

Click on the widget above to read the overview on the study and our position or go to the petition website here.

Ledy VanKavage just published this article on May 16, 2011 Love-A-Bull Challenges University Hospital for Delving into Animal Control Policy.

Filed under: Alerts, Former Homepage

Our fearless leaders have worked to compile a list of pending TX bills that affect us and the lives of pitties (and other family dogs) if passed.

We originally posted this information during the regular session of the 82nd Texas Legislature. However, lawmakers have some unfinished business and are now in special session. Lawmaking is a full-time job with year-round planning, so it’s to our benefit to CALL or WRITE now in anticipation for the future (even though some of these bills may not be addressed this time around).

Here’s how to find your legislators: http://www.fyi.legis.state.tx.us

OPPOSE

OPPOSE HB 1919: ALLOWS ANYONE TO KILL ANY DOG WITHOUT PENALTY
(Lydia sent out a detailed email as well.)
http://www.thln.org/index.cfm?pageID=6B6BB9C4-3048-C277-11173D65AE8B1D30

SUPPORT

SUPPORT HB 1102: STRONGER PUNISHMENT FOR PET THEFT
http://www.thln.org/index.cfm?pageID=CB0D9571-3048-C277-118AFACB4F964AFE

SUPPORT HB 3450: COMPANION ANIMAL PROTECTION ACT (BANNING GASSING AND “CONVENIENCE KILLING” AND REQUIRING TRANSPARENCY IN SHELTERS)
http://s312584456.initial-website.com/legislation/texas-capa

SUPPORT HB 323 (AND SB 279): PROTECTS FAMILY PETS IN DOMESTIC VIOLENCE CASES
http://www.thln.org/index.cfm?pageID=F41EB87B-3048-C277-11605FE493991CB0

SUPPORT HB 1451: REGULATES LARGE-SCALE BREEDERS
http://www.thln.org/index.cfm?pageID=6B6BB9C4-3048-C277-11173D65AE8B1D30

Filed under: Alerts, Former Homepage

We received this recent email and cute story from Anna who adopted Bellamy (formerly known as Stacy).

I had a picture from Easter that I meant to send around that time but it slipped my mind. Bell was a big hit with the kids during Easter and when it came time for some pictures, the only way we could get all the kids together and happy was to put Bell in the middle. Of course she did not mind the task one bit; sweet doggy didn’t know what to do with all the attention. She has definitely become part of the family. My nephew (boy in picture) doesn’t even say hi to me anymore, he just asks “doggy?” every time he sees me. She is so wonderful; I hear Deb talk about dogs up for adoption on the radio and it makes me smile because that is how I found her. I’m really glad she is being a voice in Austin to make people think about the dogs. I hope all is well with love-a-bull!

You can read about Bellamy’s story on our Success Stories page.

Easter photo with Bellamy surrounded by all the kids.

Filed under: Uncategorized