One of my clients had a Malamute that they had acquired as a small puppy. She was a wonderful dog in many ways. She loved people (as almost all Malamutes do), but she also loved cats, and they even had pet rabbits that she would try to mother. She also got along very well with other dogs. She was so laid-back and placid, and she never left their large yard. But she developed Cushing’s Disease and diabetes and after a long illness she died at age 14.

The family had loved her so much. They wanted another dog just like her. I had told them, many times over the years, that “Rosie” (not using real names) was not a typical Malamute. Mals are high-energy dogs. They love people and will bowl a person over in friendly greeting but they are almost never aggressive with people. But they are usually very dog-aggressive, at least toward dogs of the same sex, and they are very predatory with almost everything else! Small furry animals such as cats are almost irrisistable to them and they usually are not good unsupervised around other animals.

But the family had their hearts set on a dog “just like Rosie”. They found a Malamute breeder who was highly recommended and who guaranteed her dogs. They picked out a cute little wolf-sable fuzzball that was the same color as “Rosie”, and named her “Hannah”. They settled back to raise “Hannah” to be just like “Rosie”.

But “Hannah” was a typical Mal. She was Malamute through and through. She loved people. All people. But as soon as her fuzzy little legs would take her, she began leaving the yard and chasing whatever moved. As soon as they let her outside she would go fight the neighbors’ old spayed female Lab. They got her spayed. She still fought the Lab, just for the fun of fighting it seems; there wasn’t any real malice in it. She began dragging home furry little dead creatures. Chipmunks. Groundhogs. Cats. More cats. A skunk. The family had underground fencing installed and put a shock collar on her to teach her to stay on their grounds (after all, that had worked for their neighbors’ German Shepherds). “Hannah” went over the line, got shocked, yipped, and went on her merry way. She would jump through, yip, come back with something dead in her mouth, and yip again as she came back to her yard. Over and over again.

The family asked me,as I was shaving “Hannah’s” leg to treat a bite from a rattlesnake (which she killed), “What is wrong with our dog? She doesn’t act a thing like a Malamute. ‘Rosie’ never did these things”. But as I explained to them, “Hannah” was indeed acting like a typical Malamute. They ended up fencing their family estate. She only dug out a few times .

Don’t get me wrong, I love Malamutes! I’ve had several over the years. But part of loving a breed is knowing the breed. I took a beautiful Mal as a rescue one time, intending to keep him just long enough to find him another home because the client was moving and couldn’t take him. He was the friendliest dog in the world. He killed four of my cats in the four days I had him, “snap snap the cat is gone”, wagging his tail the whole time. I gave him to a farmer who had large acreage where he could run. As soon as he let him out of his truck, Hank killed four ducks and a cat. All the time wagging his tail saying “Wow! Look what a good boy I am”.

Mals are just that way. Not vicious, just predatory. (The farmer liked Hank so much that he kept him. But he kept him at his other farm, where he runs beef cattle and has no small livestock).

I hope that they settle this incident without killing the dog. It was just being true to its nature. Its owner should pay damages and maybe a fine for allowing the dog to run loose and harass livestock. And if the owner isn’t willing to care for the dog and keep it confined to their own property, they should let a Malamute rescue group help them find it a home suitable for a Mal.

They won’t hurt people, but other animals–cats, calves, sheep, goats, chickens and other dogs–these can be harassed, injured or killed by single dogs, or worse, packs of them.

These dogs require a special sort of person to keep them, someone who is comfortable being a pack leader, who can get inside their dogs’ heads and really work with their natural instincts and mold them to the requirements of modern civilization.

I loved my dogs, very much, and they were very fun and extremely loving, but one of them could never be left near cats, and all of them were hell on wildlife. Possums, rabbits, groundhogs, squirrels and raccoons fell to them regularly, and I swear that I once watched one of my husky girls nearly run down a frickin deer! And she was a big enough dog that if she had gotten more of a drop on the deer, she would have taken it down–she was insanely strong.

So, yeah, I would look for a northern breed dog before I would a wolf in cases like this. They have no fear to go near the habitations of man and they love to chase livestock, and sometimes kill it. And they, unlike wolves, do not always eat their prey.

Left to their own devices, Malamutes are inveterate hunters, and a Mal could easily take down a calf. If wolves killed a calf there would not be much left of it when finished eating. Ditto with a truly feral pack of dogs.

It’s pet dogs running loose that cause the most damage to livestock.

Having spent 7 years of my childhood in a rural area, I can also confirm that packs of these ‘little darlings’ would quickly get together and chase (and attempt to kill) cattle, horses and deer. They’re doing what comes naturally….and what the ignorance of their owners allows.