Surprise breeds

I had a kid ask me an interesting question one day while coming through the clinic on tour with her Girl Scout troop. The question was: "What breeds have surprised you most since you graduated?" I thought it was a pretty interesting question coming from an eight year old.

My answer surprised me: Golden Retrievers and Pit Bulls (American pit bull terriers, pit bulls, stafforshire terriers - purists would argue that these are distinctly different breeds, but most of us would paint them with the same brush).

I've had more Golden Retrievers try to eat my lunch in the past 10 years than any other breed aside from German Shepherd dogs. They're also NUTS.

The opposite is try for Pitties. They're AWESOME dogs. Really great. High energy, but amazingly good dogs. They also wear their emotions on their sleeves. If they don't like you - they tell you and are honest up front. Goldens look sweet and act sweet and then suddenly turn and try to eat you alive. Same with a lot of German Shepherds.

Pitties are also very powerful, so when you get a bad apple, it really spoils it for the bunch. We don't hear about cities trying to outlaw chihuahas, even though they are by far more evil than pitties. Land Sharks. They like to eat little children. They look sweet, but then they're like that rabbit in the Holy Grail movie. (Ok, that's not fair, but you just can't trust the little buggars.)

Now - it's not fair to generalize. And I shouldn't. I've seen sweet and mean of just about every breed imaginable. But the girl asked what breeds surprised me. My preconceived notions were that the goldens would be sweet and the pitties evil. Nope. What a surprise!

AMH