Gotta agree with mantis. Place always more interesting with a tonne of fighting rather than the current vanilla and generally sycophantic tone to so much of it.
I knew a dog once that used to like to watch other dogs fight. He was an all black medium sized spaniel cross with loppy ears and a semi-docked tail. His name, ironically, was Pal.
Pal's elderly owners would often travel with our little group, and it was when we moved on to a camp that was already occupied or when other Gypsies moved on to our camp that Pal would indulge his passion.
In these situations, the incumbent dogs are understandably very territorial, and who can blame them? It's their patch. They were here first. By the same token, the newcomers are pretty reserved and non-confrontational, just like newbies are in any situation. This worked out just fine. For the first few days there was a bit of stiff legged walking around and a fair amount of butt sniffing, and soon they were all one big happy family.
Not when Pal was around though. He used to go charging through the stiff-leg butt sniffing ceremonies at a full stretch gallop, snapping and snarling like a dervish. Then, when the mother of all fights broke out, he would hide beneath his owners wagon to gleefully watch the carnage through the slats of the front steps, or the spokes of a wheel.
This went on for years. Pal caused hundreds of fights without ever really getting involved.
Then one day, while making his customary escape, he was intercepted by a big saluki x greyhound lurcher that had missed the actual fight kick-off by dint of the fact that he was just returning from a coursing expedition with his master.
The contest was brief and decisive. Within less than 30 seconds Pal was in full retreat with his tail firmly between his legs. Screaming like a banshee, he gave us a wonderful demonstration of the Doppler effect as he passed us on his way to the horizon.
Pal didn't return for a couple of days. When he did he was hobbling along, almost unable to walk. His face was a mask of pain and he looked as if he had aged 10 years.
The old couple asked me to examine him and, after tying a handkerchief around his muzzle to prevent him from biting me I began to look him over.
I expected to find a broken limb or a severed tendon, but the truth was, I couldn't see anything obvious. Then I saw what I at first thought to be a burr stuck to the long hair on the underside of his belly. Looking more closely, I was shocked to realise that it was one of his testicles. It had fallen through a ragged hole in his scrotum and was now dangling from a few inches of wizened pipe-work. It looked like a forgotten conker, hanging from a schoolboy's pocket.
After a quick conflab with Pal's owners, I snipped off the outcast cojone, painted the exit hole with a generous dollop of Gypsy horseman's ubiquitous "blue antisceptical" paint, and left him to the whim of the Gods.
After a long, (and presumably somewhat uncomfortable) convalescence, Pal made what was a swings and roundabouts recovery on the important-to-dogs-ometer.
On the minus side, he had lost all interest in chasing girl dogs and fight-starting, but on the plus side, he had added at least two octaves to his vocal range.
Author