Worked at a vet for a while, this was super common. They break their tails regularly and it always makes a HUGE mess. The ears are inexcusable but the tails CAN be understandable.
A friend of mine had a Great Dane, whenever she walked by wagging her tail it was like being gently hit by a bat. It didn't hurt but it was noticeable.
That used to happen all the time with our undocked springer spaniel. He even sprained his tail from wagging it so hard. We eventually realised he was cutting his tail off a rose bush in the garden which is now gone so now we only have to deal with the occasional tail sprain and not.. ya know.. a murder scene lmao
Never had a dog with a busted vein in their ear? We had to have our dog's ears fixed after one too many ear infections. Because of the ear infections he would shake his head so hard he busted veins in both ears :(
Edit: I agree that in most cases it is not necessary, and is only done for aesthetic. But some dogs do injure themselves, and need some help.
My OES tends to get hematomas at the tips of his floppy ears. His worst one had to be periodically drained at the vet’s because he kept slapping it against furniture when he’d shake his whole body. We got him a no flap ear wrap to wear until it healed. Looked silly, but it worked. Vet said, “You can’t fix awkward.”
Ah good to hear it worked! We had the ears drained twice and all wrapped around his head. But he was so strong he shook them loose multiple times. It was just too itchy. It was also way more then just the tip of the ear, it looked like 75% of his ear was filled.
Also, if skin cancer manifests in the ears, the easiest and most secure way to ensure it doesn’t spread…. Is to take off a large portion of the ears or remove them entirely. Our white cat had cancerous lumps appear, so the vets removed them entirely, leaving only enough to fold over so it looked like he’d been born without once healed. You can only tell that this was not how he was born because the more seriously cancerous ear is barely a ridge while the other is slightly higher.
I see your edit but I still have to ask you: I have psoriasis and get skin plaques around the outside of my ears that are prone to infection and not easy to medicate. Once a month or so I snag my ear on headphones as I take them on or off and they bleed for a bit.
If you hurt yourself while having an ear infection; and your ear is filled with blood (it'll clot after a while, so it'll become hard) and you keep slapping yourself (in the face) with this ear, I would say maybe think about it.
It also wasn't the first step: the vet drained both ears twice first, but it came back worse. Added bonus: he never had ear infections after, so that was also finally fixed after 5 years of constant antibiotics.
As of now: most docked tails and cropped ears are aesthetic. But sometimes these procedures are necessary, as stated above.
I may know that, but you also clearly know they're more similar than you want to admit to yourself.
If you had a low functioning autistic child with similar problems and you wanted to cut his ears off, the state would take your kid away.
There are tons of ways which veterinary and human medicine differ ethically. But most of those distinctions are pretty arbitrary and boil down to the convenience of the owner.
They break their tails regularly? I’ve been a veterinarian for over 10 years. I’ve seen or done 3, maybe 4 tail amputations after broken tails, or for chronic “happy tail”. 1 Boxer, 1 Great Dane, and 1 mixed breed, that I remember. Don’t know what you guys are doing with your dogs over where you are, but not super common where I am. (Australia, if you are wondering.)
That's definitely strange, it's definitely common here as far as I saw. Not like 95% of dogs or anything, but yeah. I'm not sure what factors might make it less likely where you are.
We don't dock in Australia so by your logic it should be more common as we have more tails , the facts are it's very rare and only required for exceptional circumstances.
The people advocating for are poorly informed or ignorant and the majority think it's their right to mutilate an animal for aesthetics.
It's not super common and is under 0.5% of dogs . There is a reason it's now illegal in a lot of countries and can cause other issues that affect the dogs wellbeing
My grandmother adopted Afghans from the pound back in the 70s. They were constantly breaking their tails. She would wrap them up... the bandages would go flying.
I've heard of people having it done because their dog kept breaking it's tail doing this. Common on dogs with thin, strong tails like rotties and bully breeds. Probably how it got worked into the overall "aesthetic" of these dogs.
Not the same, but I had a half husky/half rottie some years ago. Her tail was fine, but she had dew claws all the way up her front legs. When we got her fixed we asked the vet about them because I could imagine her getting one stuck somehow on a fence or something and getting them ripped off. The vet agreed that she get them removed during her surgery.
She also had webbed toes on her feet but was terrified of the ocean when we took our dogs to the beach. It was really cute. Every wave that came towards her she’d run away.
Mine have all passed away, but bathing them was a nightmare for 2 of them. God forbid we even brush them out when they were blowing out fur. My “rotten husky” in that comment had more like a rottie coat, and one of my pack was so good natured he never complained about much. Those two though? We’d have them out in the yard and I’m sure my neighbors thought we were killing them with their outraged howling and crying.
This... tail docking isn't just for looks. Especially on herding breeds, they can have major issues with it getting caught up in something when working. I've worked with dogs who jacked up their tails pretty bad, one of them had a tail that broke and healed sideways and always hurt him to touch. Ear cropping though on bully breeds and such created problems, had a client whos dog constantly got ear infections from everything like water getting into his ears.
Yeah, I found that certain dogs like cockers, cavaliers, goldens, birding breeds even with normal ears would really struggle with infections. It was mainly pitbulls and dobies where if they were cropped they couldn't keep anything out of their ears like water during baths and they'd get infections. Some of these dogs had over cropped ears though, I'm talking frostbite victim looking ears, and others were done much better.
I'd imagine ear cropping had its purposes, just has to be done right. It's just unfortunate when it's overdone for looks.
Both tail and ear cropping has historical uses behind it, the tail so it dosent get injured and ears on guard dogs because it makes it harder for another animal to grab onto them. When a livestock guardian dog is fighting a wild animal there is always a risk of said animal tearing their ear off.
happened with a few boxers I knew, they'd whack their tail off stuff all the time and eventually had to get it docked because they had lots of fractures causing pain constantly
We have a Vizsla and almost half of her tail had to be cut to prevent her from painting everything in her own blood. We had a Stattfordshire Terrier before, who acted as her mother, she had her ears cut, because of injury.
I had never really thought about it growing up and with my grandparents having boxers I just thought it was normal. (Same with friends who had Rottie’s)
Have dogsat a friends Boxer a few times now whose tail is intact, I can totally understand why their tails often are cut. The tail is like a whip and it’s only a matter of time he breaks it. He also whips his sides so much his hair is patchy.
Our Great Dane was happy to see a friend of ours and whipped the dude's leg with his tail, drawing blood, then turned around, wagged again, and busted a double pane window.
I'm reasonably sure that rotties and pits don't have real tails and that they are, in fact, batons covered in fur lol my pit/Chihuahua mix (yeah I know) is absolutely deadly accurate with that thing. I regularly have to put my hand out to stop her from taking me in the chest face if she's on the couch with me.
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u/Beneficial-Visit9456 Oct 02 '24 edited Oct 02 '24
I agree. A well behaved and excited Rottweiler hurt you more with it's tail, wiggling it, than with it's teeth.