It would be nice if we could give a good nonviolence lecture to our animals and they would applaud and thank us. Unfortunately, since they can't speak our language, we must speak theirs.

For years, I existed in uneasy alliance with my current dog. He too had been an abandoned baby. He had been nursed on a bottle and had survived parvo. However, the woman who rescued him found him hard to deal with and did not bother to neuter him or train him. He was so hard to deal with that she was going to send him to the pound. Because I had worked with dogs when I was younger, I thought I could handle him.

At first he seemed pretty docile and happy go lucky. Then I took him for a walk. He weighed about 50 pounds at ten months. Part way into the walk he tried to attack a mastiff/pit bull-looking creature that outweighed him by more than double.

Other than the dog fighting thing and the cat chasing thing and the peeing on strange men thing, he was a sweetheart and became quite loving. We had a sort of partnership going. Sometimes we did things his way and sometimes we did things mine. Unfortunately, I have a physical disability. This state of affairs could not go on. I was in constant back pain from the jolt I got everytime he saw a cat and hit the end of the leash.

I took him to one trainer. She talked like a Nazi to him and jerked the poor baby around unmercifully.

I took him to another trainer. She tried to physically force him to lay flat on his side in a submissive posture. He tried to bite her. What can I say? I didn't like her either.

Finally I read Cesar Milan's book "Cesar's Way." Thank you Cesar.

The fact is that no one else can really train your animal. Trainers can only train you to dominate your animal. From the books (by several authors that I read) I learned the proper way to use a choke chain (long part on the outside), the best way to make my dog come (throw something at him), and last but not least, how to make him lie on his side unagressively in a completely flat position while another dog (usually the Chihuahuas running loose around here) attempts to attack him. This prone position defuses the potential fight. My dog does not come near my food because I growl at him. He does not play with anything that is not "his." Moreover, he now adores me, follows me from room to room in a properly worshipful manner, and I enjoy walking him so much more.

Here's the bottom line about our pets. Either we are alpha or they are. Wimpy people shouldn't own aggressive pets. Wimpy people shouldn't own large pets. Probably, wimpy people shouldn't own pets with claws.

Please don't assume that all this submission will make a normally protective dog nonprotective of you. He will defend you with his life when you are pack leader. I had an angry man come at me with a pipe wrench. My dog went for him. Only my grip on the leash kept that guy from being dog food. Before, he would probably have let that guy pummel me. My dog's only defense of me would have been a stream of urine. Now I am not only boss; I am boss with a body guard.

I more a dog than a cat person, but I suspect many of the techniques that work with dogs will also work with cats.

I like birds just as much as the next person. I am especially fond of the mockingbird's trill. Of course mockingbirds are agressive to other birds.

Some of the phoniness in this thread reeks worse than cat piss.

I agree that, ideally, animal owners should not let their animals on other people's property. But I am sick of the notion that these cats like living indoors better than they like living outdoors. Has anyone interviewed the cats? The only people that spend their whole lives indoors are agoraphobic. That's an illness folks! I am also sick of the word euthanize used in this thread. What is wrong with the word kill? Is it too graphic for city folks?

BTW, when I lived in the country with the outdoor cats, I measured their territory in sections not acres. My property = their property. I imagine that they killed a few birds, but they killed many more mice and that was cool with me. (However, probably not as many as the five foot blacksnake that lived in the house.)

Now about those songbirds: What do you do, anonymous bird nut, to keep God's songbirds off your property? They carry diseases you know.

It's a messy world we live in. Why don't you go manicure your lawn with a pair of nail scissors?

You accuse me of promoting irresponsible pet ownership, but in fact my cats are kept indoors, and I strongly urge all cat owners to do the same.

The sad fact is that not everyone keeps their cats indoors or, if they let them outdoors, keep them on their own property. However, it happens, and your rant about some cat crossing onto your precious yard is a huge overreaction.

As for my fist and your nose, the point of my last post is that there are people out there -- and you might be one -- who claim the right to hurt or kill pets who cross onto their precious property. I can tell you, as a pet owner and as someone with common sense, that anyone who hurts another person's cat is asking to be arrested, and begging to be stomped on.

I don't know if my cats enjoy being indoors more than they enjoyed being outdoors. They do seem to like eating regular meals, playing with toys and laser pointers, sleeping on a warm sofa, and staring at the feeder birds. They know where the door is and don't try to go out. I don't know why that is, but I'm sure you do. I suspect they enjoy being alive, and that they enjoyed getting rid of the ear mites, tapeworms, roundworms, ringworm, and other maladies they had (the most recent cat had all four) as outdoor cats.

Cat feces are rife with toxoplasmosis, which is a serious hazard for small children playing in sandboxes. What bird disease is likely to present specifically to small children playing in sandboxes? I'm something of an authority on bird diseases, and know of no dangers healthy wild backyard birds pose to humans. (Feral pigeons are another story, but even they cause most problems where they roost rather than in backyards.)

The reason I don't clip my lawn with manicure scissors is that I prefer natural vegetation. Lawns subsidize Canada Geese, the only birds in most areas that can digest grass. We humans mistakenly subsidize them at unnatural population levels, too. Oh, well.

I'm not sure why you're focusing on one poster's anonymity among a whole spectrum of people using aliases. "AKA Smith" indeed.