Dear Editor,
When an educator called me a few weeks ago to ask my opinion on whether he should cut the tail off his Doberman, I was totally taken aback. He said one of his family members told him that Dobermans were supposed to be tail-less. I wonder what God thinks about that.
I told him he should ask his dog what he thought about it but in my opinion it is totally inhumane to cut the tail off any animal. I asked him, “If you dock it, how will your dog tell you he is happy or swat flies and other insects.”
“Dogs laugh with their tails,” Max Eastman
On July 18, 2006, while driving down Anira Street, Queenstown, I rescued a very sick dog whose ears were badly disfigured by a “back street butcher.” In my mind’s eye I can still picture the horrible sight with irregular cuts, partial healing and loose threads dangling from the poor dog’s ears. A vet recently told me about one of his Pit Bull patients whose ears were badly infested with worms because an unqualified person had clipped his ears and didn’t treat them properly.
Another vet told me of an unqualified “butcher” who has gone into business clipping dogs ears because many persons cannot afford to go to a vet and have it done correctly. That individual neither uses anesthesia nor provides follow up attention.
Once again, it is our faithful friends (this time Pit Bulls and Dobermans) that feel the pain. Why can’t men grow up and leave animals the way they were made?
Yours faithfully,
Syeada Manbodh
