Malamutes being targeted as wolf-dog hybrids

[Malamum]

http://www.twincities.com/mld/twincities/news/10169887.htm?1c

City cries wolf; owner cries dog

A St. Paul ordinance prohibiting wolf-dog hybrids has one woman fighting to save her pets' lives.

BY ROBERT INGRASSIA

Pioneer Press


Kimberly Grebowski just wants her dogs back. She's been working to spring Odin and Razor from the St. Paul dog pound since late August, when they were nabbed running unleashed on the East Side.

"They're my babies," said Grebowski, 34, an unemployed customer service representative. "I miss them so much."

But city officials won't let the animals go, unless Grebowski promises to find a home outside St. Paul for her beloved pets. The reason: In the city's view, the animals are wolf-dog hybrids. As such, Odin and Razor are prohibited from living in St. Paul.

"I've got to protect the community," said Bill Stephenson, the city's animal control manager. "From my experience, they're dangerous animals. They don't know when to be tame or when to be wild."

Stephenson recalled the day in December 1997 when animal control officers subdued a wolf-dog hybrid that was eyeing sheep in a pen at the University of Minnesota's St. Paul campus. When the owner came to pick up the animal, it attacked her. Stephenson had the hybrid killed.

Grebowski gets her day in court Dec. 3 at City Hall, where she will argue during an administrative hearing that Odin and Razor are Alaskan malamutes. She said she got the dogs as pups from a friend two years ago. She said she was told at the time that the dogs were malamutes from a breeder in Wisconsin.

The outcome could be a matter of life or death for the animals. Should the city prevail, Grebowski would be given a chance to find someone outside St. Paul to accept the animals. The task could be tough, because most animal rescue shelters won't accept wolf-dog hybrids, mainly because of legal liability concerns. If Grebowski couldn't find a home, the animals would be killed, city officials said.

Grebowski could pick up Odin and Razor immediately and send them packing if she were willing to sign a paper acknowledging they are hybrids. She said she wouldn't do that.

"They're malamutes," she said. "I don't want to condemn them, which is what would happen if I sign something saying they have wolf blood in them."

For now, Odin and Razor are living in cages at the Animal Control Center near Como Park, a far cry from their old romping grounds at Grebowski's duplex on East Lawson Avenue. Grebowski gets to visit for five minutes three days a week. She visited Friday, choking up when she saw Odin and Razor in their side-by-side cages.

"It breaks my heart to see them like this," she said. "Since they've been in here, it's really taken a toll. Don't get me wrong, the people at the center are nice, and it's clean. But they're not allowed outside. Razor is really quiet and kind of forlorn. Odin used to be quiet. Now he barks all the time."

Grebowski said Odin and Razor are well-behaved dogs with up-to-date shots. She said she generally kept them in her yard, which is fenced, but they got out Aug. 25. She said she was told that calls from concerned people at a nearby senior-citizens home brought out an animal control officer.

Grebowski said the city has told her she would have to prove her pets' nonwolf lineage back four generations to prove they're pure dog. She said she has tried to contact the Wisconsin breeder but has had no success.

Determining whether an animal has wolf bloodlines is closer to an art than a science. There is no blood or genetic test to indicate whether a dog is part wolf. When questionable cases arise, Stephenson calls on Peg Callahan, executive director of the Wildlife Science Center in Forest Lake.

Callahan, who provides the service to St. Paul for free, has 19 years of experience working with wolves. She said she bases her analysis mainly on an animal's eyes, nose, ears, body type and paws.

"We can't pull a blood sample and say, 'Yes, this is a hybrid,' " Callahan said. "It's subjective, and that's what frustrating in the hybrid issue."

Callahan said there's a fairly robust market for hybrids. A host of Internet sites offer them for sale, though Callahan said breeders often exaggerate the percentage of wolf in an animal to boost the value.

"Maybe it's a macho thing," Callahan said. "But it's not humane to have these animals. There are very few people in the community able to handle the wild behaviors that these animals can exhibit, like when they go after other pets or people."


********************************

While I don't agree with the breeding or keeping of wolf-dog hybrids it's really scary that these morons can just go round deciding what they think is a wolf-dog. If you have a look at the picture in the article, the dog in question clearly looks like a Malamute.

Grebowski could pick up Odin and Razor immediately and send them packing if she were willing to sign a paper acknowledging they are hybrids. She said she wouldn't do that.

"They're malamutes," she said. "I don't want to condemn them, which is what would happen if I sign something saying they have wolf blood in them."

The first thing that popped in my head after reading that sentence was the Salem witch hunts. We won

[Seijun]

I, as well as a practical army of others, am currently trying to help out with this poor woman's case. She is taking this to trial soon. They wanted her to prove that they were mals for at least 4 generations which she couldn't do. Her mals have light brown eyes, and light eyes was supposed to be a sign of wolf inheritance according to the HSUS, that is why I asked earlier for pics of mals with light eyes. She should have enough pictures now to help prove that mals CAN have light eyes. She sent us (the wolfdog community) pics of her babes, and they are as malamute as ever, just with slightly bigger ears and small feet, perhaps from poor breeding. Anyway, there is absolutely NOTHING wolfy about them and the word of a neighbor is all they have saying they are wolfdogs. She SHOULD be able to win this case but knowing those wackos, they might do anything to "prove" they are wolfdogs. This place has a history of confiscating "wolf hybrids" who are dogs. They once confiscated a purebred Irish wolfhound as a "hybrid". Unfortunately stuff like this happens a LOT. EVERY time a place bans wolfdogs innocent dogs suffer because people mislabel them. Although it is said that 80-90% of wolfdogs are sold as having more wolf than they actually are, about 60% of the wolfdogs I see could pass as pure dogs and probably are pure dogs. It is VERY sad; "Salem Witch Hunts" is exactly the way to describe it. A few months back we had to help save two dogs in GA that were supposed to be wolfdogs even though they looked just like shep/husky/mal crosses (the one could have passed as a purebred black GSD). They were going to be PTS because wolfdogs were banned. Even sadder thing is wolfdogs are not at all as "dangerous" and "vicious" as many people are led to believe. They get a bad rap just like the pities do. :(

~Seij

[Malamum]

Seijun,

Can you keep us posted on the outcome?

[between the wrinkles]

please do, i feel so sorry for this poor lady and her dogs being caged up. and im gld i could give you some pics seijun. :) gooooood luuuuck

[Malamum]

Actually Seijun, a lot of people on a Malamute forum I visit are quite upset about this and want to know if there is anything they can do to help. If there is are you able to let them know - the link to the topic over there is

http://www.wildpaw.com/forum/index.php?s=e7c95acf5befb2fb4bb806af61fca6f7&showtopic=2360&st=15

[Seijun]

I will keep you all UTD when results start coming up. Malamum, I will visit the forum for you, thanks for posting the link. I have been looking for a mal forum for a long time.

~Seij

[courtnek]

correct me if I'm wrong, but arent Mals and Huskies the closest things to wolves, in the gene pool? THIS IS SOOO WRONG!!!@!!

genetically, they arent wolves...these bastards want to say they are, beacuse "they look that way"....isnt this what prejudice is based on?
PRE-JUDGEMENT of the facts???

:o :o :o :o :o

[imported_Kat]

This is rather disturbing indeed. I condemn the breeding and keeping of wolves and their hybrids but although Mals and other Northern breeds are closely related to wolves, they are still very much domestic dogs. Hasn't this woman got pedigree pepers for her dogs? I hope that she gets her babies back soon.

[Pumpkin the musher]

The St. Paul paper is our "local" paper, meaning that it's the closest city to us with a daily paper, so I've been hearing about this for a while. Her dogs appear to be Malamutes, but to play devil's advocate, there are allot of breeders in this area who produce wolf hybrids- so there is a problem with unethical breeders and ignorant puppy buyers. In the last year I've seen ads for Wolves crossed with Siberians, white GSD's, Mals, and even Great Danes... :o I can't even imagine that last one. :-?

[Seijun]

courtnek napisał(a):

correct me if I'm wrong, but arent Mals and Huskies the closest things to wolves, in the gene pool? THIS IS SOOO WRONG!!!@!!

Although huskies and mals are closer to wolves in temperament than any other breed, some recent studies showed that they were not the closest genetically. I don't remember what breed was closest though.

The woman got her dogs from a friend. The dogs did come from a mal breeder but they must either not know the breeder or the breeder has disappeared because they don't seem to have contributed to the saving of the dogs they produced. Perhaps I am just being pre-judgmental though, all I know is that I have heard nothing of the breeder-only that they did exist at one point. Regardless, the dogs have no history of being called wolfdogs and they don't even look or act like one. Junk like this happens so much, I'm sick of it.

~Seij (for the woofer in my avatar, who thinks at times that she is a Malamute)

[pyrless]

what the...my elkie mix has light-gold eyes for god's sake. (he's mixed with collie). what the %# is the matter with these people?????
Breeders-could this woman enlist the help of another Malamute breeder to testify to the dog's heritage? From my experience, Malamutes are taller and heavier of bone with a square-type head, right? Could they put some purebred Mals and wolf hybrids side by side, maybe do some behavior testing at the hearing? Just a thought...

[Seijun]

We have some malamute people coming in to help testify that they are not wolfdogs.

~Seij

[Smooshie]

This canine witch hunt is getting completely out of hand :x ......BSL is making everyone paranoid and crazy....all of a sudden every Tom Dick and Harry is a dog expert. The misidentification of breeds is a very scary thing...no dog owner should feel like they are in the 'safe' zone.....I have seen GSD's falsely accused of being wolves and Danes misidentified as Pit Bulls lately...it is pure insanity.

My male Boxer is routinely mistaken for a Pit Bull....I worry that if BSL becomes an issue in my area that I will face the same injustice as this poor woman. Some brainiac will decide my dog is something he's not and I have no way to prove his actual lineage...he is a rescue. :roll:

please keep us informed seij....

[between the wrinkles]

my son has light eyes, and his ears to tip a little. is he part wolf? :o please, help to uncover my case.


:lol:

[courtnek]

My FOXHOUND was mis-identified as a Pit. True, the guy was drunk, but still....a dear friend has a PB Husky.....who neighbors think is a wolf, even though she has the husky blue eyes. Its just ridiculous and scary at the same time. NO ONE else around here has a foxhound. I get "looks" "comments" and nasty back stares all the time. Especially when she bays. Ive had people ask me if she is part wolf, because the
bay to the unknowing sounds like a howl....She's about as "wolfish" (and dangerous) as a goldfish....

:o :o :o :o :o

thank dog BSL has been shot down here repeatedly...

[Pumpkin the musher]

Back in 1995 I ended up with what I thought at the time was a Malamute-I rescued her from the neighbouring farmer who had caught her eating his chickens and chasing his cows. :-? Fairly normal husky behavior if allowed to roam unfortunately. I tracked down her owner, and he didn't want her so I kept her. She turned out to be 1/8 timber wolf . Even having some wolf in her, does she look like a wolf dog? So who then should decide what is a wolf dog and what isn't?

[Seijun]

Your malamute, like hers, could pass as pure. At only 1/8 wolf though, it is entirely normal for wolf looks and behavior to be gone. When content gets that low, no one, and I mean NO one, expert or not, would be able to tell if it was part wolf. With any northern mix or "pure" that is rescued or comes from a bad breeder, there is always going to be that slight risk that there is wolf somewhere in the background. "true" wolfdogs are fairly uncommon though compared to the number of misrepresented ones, so in most cases if the dog doesn't look wolf, and doesn't act wolf, most rescuers will just call it a dog unless they find out it had a history of being called a wolfdog, it came from a supposed wolfdog breeder, or they find out that wolf was supposedly added way back in the line.

As for your question on who decides what is wolf and what isn't, most rescuers follow a seriously flawed identification system set up by the HSUS. In a court case like this, "experts" can include wolf/wolfdog experts/rescuers, northern breed experts/rescuers, vets, and AC officers. USUALLY, a vet or AC officer is used as an expert, unfortunate because these people most likely had absolutely no training on identifying wolfdogs, but are called in as experts because, as a vet and AC officer, they are regarded as canine experts by the public because canines are what they specialize in. On some occasions, a wolf or wolfdog expert is called in to give his opinion-unfortunate again because many so called wolf and wolfdog experts are NOT what they claim to be. Northern breed rescuers are probably the best to use as "experts". Having had a LOT of experience in northern breeds, they will know if the dogs looks like just a plain northern mix dog, or if it truly is something "different". When telling a wolfdog from dog, looks are most often what the conclusion is based on. If it looks like a wolf, it can be called part wolf. There is no sure-fire way of telling a wolfdog from dog though, and it was once told to me that unless the animal is over 80% wolf, you can never be 100% sure that it is part wolf and not just a pure dog that happens to look a lot like a wolf. This is something I must say I have to agree with. In our case, we have a mal rescuer and a wolfdog "expert"/rescuer/not sure which or who exactly who will be there to help defend the woman's claim that the dogs are mals. Like I said earlier however, there is of course always going to be a minute chance that they do have wolf background (this could be said for ANY mixed breed dog or dog who came from a bad breeder or breeder who does not keep long-term accurate records on the dogs). BUT, because they do not look or act like hybrids, and they have no history of being called or sold as such, there is nothing anyone can do to prove they are part wolf. With absolutely no reason to suspect wolf inheritance anyway, there is no reason why they shouldn't be called just plain dogs, and no relevent reason why anyone should think they are anything but dogs. In all reality, the chance that they are part wolf would be incredibly small, especially considering that they came from a mal breeder and have always been called malamutes. It has always been my opinion though that if it is low as 1/8, and/or the animal is several generations removed from a pure wolf, does not act or even look like a wolf, it should no longer be considered a *wolf*dog. The whole point of a wolfdog being a wolfdog is that it has RECENT wolf inheritance. Many people beleive that a wolfdog should be considered a dog by the time it is 5 generations removed from a wolf (each generation having been bred with a dog, not with another wolfdog). Bengals for instance are considered domestic by the fifth generaion in many places.

~Seij

[pyrless]

doesn't someone have to prove beyond a doubt that this woman's dogs either are/aren't wolf hybrids? at any rate, doesn't that just devolve into he said/she said? this is ridiculous. good vibes, everyone!

[Pumpkin the musher]

Trinka did exhibit a certain amount of wolf behavior. She regurgitated food for her puppies, she would "store" food for later by urinating on it then burying it, :-? she insisted on moving her puppies, even though there was really nowhere to go with them, she would carry all 11 to one side of the puppy pen, pile them up in a heap, then move them back to her house. :tard: . This seemed to satisfy her need to move them. She also did not lap water, but would suck it up between her lips, presumably to make less noise. She actually wasn't the brightest bulb on the tree however, compared to my purebred Alaskans.

[Seijun]

Pyrless, the problem is that it is impossible to prove beyond reason of a doubt, even with papers (ESPECIALLY with papers it seems, since papers are often falsified). Yet papers are still used whenever possible as "proof" that a dog is/isn't part wolf. In this case I don't know if the dog has papers, and even if it did it wouldn't matter since they want the papers for 4 generations to prove mal, not just the paper documentation for those two individual dogs. If papers aren't available, they just use "expert opinion", which to them seems as good as "beyond reason of a doubt". Stinky system. :-?

Pumpkin: :lol: I had to laugh when I saw your comment on water. Someone mentoned once (not sure where) that they knew a wolfdog breeder who culled all the pups that lapped water, under the conclusion that dogs who didn't lap water had more wolf in them. Wolves can lap OR "sip", neither one proves wolf inheritance. What I mean by wolf behavior is more the intensity of their behavior-i.e, communication skills, awareness of suroundings, reactions to stimuli, etc. It's difficult to describe, something you understand best by seeing it for yourself. That's cute the way you describe your dog :D Regurgitation of food is something I have always been curious about. Apparently it can happen in pure dogs but it is not usual unless there is a need for it. Some wolfdogs will regurgitate food regardless of their being a "need" to.

~Seij

[Pumpkin the musher]

My mother went to Alaska in the late 1950's and brought back a half Alaskan /half arctic wolf puppy. She bred her to a Samoyed and she kept the one male puppy whom she named Nanook- He was pure white, very furry and weighed in at 120 lbs. He was the dog I "grew up with", and he was an incredible animal. We also had a toy poodle who would go outside in the winter and sit on Nookie when her feet got cold. I'll try to find some old pics that I can scan - he was very beautiful. Unfortunately he was run over in our yard by a UPS truck when he was 12 years old. :(