"Judging" Dogs As Livestock?

Why do bureaucrats have to make things so difficult? So some people built a dog kennel for breeding purposes in a U.S. Forest Service easement that permits "livestock" farming" which precludes a dog kennel. A federal judge ruled dogs can't be defined as livestock. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals over turned that ruling.

So, it boils down to what the definition of livestock is and apparently there is more than one. Here is the definition in the dictionary on my computer:

livestock |ˈlīvˌstäk|
noun
farm animals regarded as an asset : markets for the trading of livestock.

Well, that's pretty ambiguous! This controversy can open up a whole spate on unintended conclusions! Okay. I have a dog. This time of year it would be a stretch to call him "live" anything. This is usually where and how you will find him. I must admit, though, on occasion people seeing me walking him have mistaken him for a calf. What can I say?

Being diligent, however, the justices looked at several definitions. They found that by some, fish, guinea pigs, ants and bees could also fall under the definition. I won't even try to figure out how they came to that conclusion!

Herein lies the problem. Most towns, cities, counties - even neighborhoods, have rules regarding livestock on one's property. I know there is a limit to how many dogs you can have in our county. Our neighborhood also has limits, again somewhat ambiguous. Some regulation goes by size. You can have a finite number of horses and cows, usually considered livestock. Yet due to size differences, sheep, Alpacas, goats , pigs and such come under a different criteria. It's all so confusing!

I'm concerned that the livestock police are going to have their on me now. One dog is okay, but we have a pond full of fish. There are at least 40 and 50 in there. I don't even want to think about ants and bees! They're hard to count since they all look alike but there are lots of them.

Do you think we could get livestock credits? We'd be okay then. After all, we don't have any guinea pigs!