Allan Dick - Beauty and the Dogs

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I feel like I’m back at school and the first day of the new term. “Good morning class — what did you do in the holidays?”

Actually I went to Nelson. Well, Totaranui for New Year and then based myself in Motueka while I researched a story on Nelson.

Totaranui is a gem — a small spot, smack bang on the coast in the middle of the Abel Tasman National Park.

It’s run by DoC in a heavily managed way. Because it is so gorgeous it’s heavily in demand, so you have to book in advance and they shut it off when they get about 800 people in.

Nelson is a lovely city, but is has a couple of issues. The first is that it has serious traffic problems in some parts that make Auckland seem free-flowing, the second is that there’s a bit of a “we’re special” feeling about the place that comes, mainly, from the art and wine communities.

Motueka is more dinkum Kiwi.

It was here I met a most remarkable couple — Rod and Leonie Haines — and they’re building their own home. What’s so remarkable about this is that he’s 67, she’s 60, he was born with no arms but has had an action-filled life, reaching heights in public life to be admired.

And, I tell you, there’s an inspirational love story here as well.

Read all about Rod and Leonie in the next issue of NZ TODAY, out in late February.

But in recent days, the media has been filled with news of dog attacks and a dog slaughter.

Just about every time a dog story hits the headlines, you can expect that the dog, or dogs, involved will be “pit bulls”.

I put “pit bulls” in quote marks because it’s a generalisation for a particular type of dog rather than the specific breed. And we all know what the “pit bull” is. It’s a dog that has the potential to be dangerous under the wrong conditions — which is what many owners like about them. They are a power symbol.

Of course the doggie people are all defensive — “there are no such things as bad dogs, just bad owners”. Rubbish.

The dogs that we know collectively as “pit bulls” are bad. Maybe good owners and good training will minimise the risk, but they are still a potential time bomb.

These “pit bulls” aren’t the only dogs that pose a potential threat, but they have the record of being involved in serious news headlines.

They are the wrong dogs, owned by the wrong people, for the wrong reasons. Ban them. There is no need for dangerous breeds of dogs

I know it’s a generalisation, but it’s true nonetheless — “pit bull” owners wear black jeans, have tattoos, earrings, mullets and drive V8s.

The slaughter of 33 dogs — again the “pit bull” type — made sickening reading. And I wasn’t prepared for it.

I listened to every radio news bulletin the morning the story broke and heard nothing about the case. There were the whinges about Telecom and the whinges about the 25 cents an hour added to the minimum wage. But nothing about 33 dogs being slaughtered in the most appalling manner.

It was only when I sauntered over to the supermarket for a loaf of Extra Thick fruit loaf that I saw the front page of the Herald that screamed the story at me.

I wondered what the newsroom staff at Newstalk ZB had been doing all morning. It was, and remains, a major story and if I had been the News Editor I would have written a story quoting the Herald — it was that important.

We will eventually learn the full story of what happened in that quarry at Wellsford when Russell Mendoza and an accomplice orchestrated the brutal slaughter of 33 of the dogs owned by Rowan Hargreaves.

Of course questions are rightly being asked about why Hargreaves needed so many dogs and there’s criticism of what appears to be the appalling conditions they lived in. But at least Hargreaves lived, and worked under the same conditions, so there was no discrimination there.

I note that a friend says Mendoza’s had to take his phone off the hook because he’s getting so many abusive phone calls. What reaction did he really think he would get once the story became public — as it always was going to be? Praise?
 

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