What is Pitbull and what it is not?

Generally nowadays “Pitbull” is known as an athletic dog with a well-structured body type, round headshaped, dominant, hard to control, tend to attack and causes irreversible damages to its environment. Some of the cynologos accept the term “Pitbull” as an upper identity or class and include “Staffordshire Bull Terrier”, “American Staffordshire Terrier”, “American Pitbull Terrier”, “American Bully”, “American Bull Dog” and “Bull Terrier” in this class. Federation Cynologique Internationale (FCI) is accepted this mentioned breeds individually in “Bull Type Terriers” upper topic and did not include Pitbull Terrier in any of the classifications. Due to having morphological similarities between “American Staffordshire Terrier” and “American Pit Bull Terriers” both breeds are mostly evaluated in the same breeds. In this study, we aimed to compare both breeds by using an official breed description of the breeds. The history of Bull Type breeds can be traced back to the early 1800s in the United Kingdom. Old English Bulldogs and English Terriers formed the ancestors of these breeds. The American Pit Bull Terriers are described in a different name (American Staffordshire Terrier) due to owners’ request of being evaluated under companion dog. During the time, American Staffordshire Terriers have been differentiated by genetically and behaviorally by selection studies and described as a separated breed in 1996 by FCI. When considering the United Kennel Club’s (UKC) breed standards of American Pitbull Terrier and Federation Cynologique International (FCI) breed standards for American Staffordshire Terrier, even though the similarities between the breeds, there are differences in terms of body-color, eye color, pigmentation around the nose/lip/eyelid, behavior and purpose of the breed, keeping aggressive dogs off the breeding can be determined.

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