![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
After we voted, I decided to walk with ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
cattitude at least partway to the subway. We went up Park Terrace East and into Isham Park, a smaller bit of green just east of Inwood Hill Park. We'd been having a pleasant time, looking at late flowers in gardens and admiring the fall colors on the trees. We started to take the long way around the lawn, when I noticed a dog standing some distance away from us, with no human visible nearby, a German shepherd or similar.
A closer look showed a couple of other dogs nearby, lying just behind a fence, in shadow.
We decided to be prudent, and walked back the way we'd come. I noticed a woman standing near the path we'd come in on, with a fairly small dog on a leash. I went over to ask her if she recognized the dogs. She didn't, and thought they might be the group of wild dogs that people have seen in the neighborhood occasionally. I'd only heard rumors of them, including signs a while back asking people to donate money so the wild dogs could be spayed/neutered, get their shots, and so on.
She decided to walk over and take a look. Cattitude started after her, so I went with him. We got closer, and saw that there were actually four dogs, with no collars. The one that had been standing started barking, and two of the others stood up.
The woman's dog barked back, and tried to approach the German shepherd, which moved toward us.
We started backing off; the woman picked her dog up and carried it. We again returned to the lawn near the dead-end circle, with Cattitude on my left, away from the dogs. It is agreed between us that I protect him from dogs, though this is the closest I've come to needing to fend off more than over-enthusiastic licking. I walked with him the rest of the way to the subway: however slight the actual risk, part of protecting him from dogs is to provide reassurance.
(Another dog-walker heard our description and said it sounded like the wild dog pack: he told us that he'd seen them three times in the last couple of years, and that they've been reported as far south as 187th Street, in Fort Tryon Park.)
After running some errands, I called the city's all-purpose information and services number, 311. It started by telling me about Election Day, offering numbers to press for more information on voting, and saying that city offices and the public schools were closed, and talking about garbage collection and alternate side parking. "For all other calls, please wait." The agent who picked up seemed unsure about what I wanted, and offered me 911. I explained that this had been an hour and a half earlier, and after taking some notes, she offered to transfer me to Animal Control. Animal Control told me about their Web site and periodically asked me to keep holding. I gave up after a while, since it seemed possible that Animal Control was also closed, and I didn't know whether the dogs were still there.
cattitude at least partway to the subway. We went up Park Terrace East and into Isham Park, a smaller bit of green just east of Inwood Hill Park. We'd been having a pleasant time, looking at late flowers in gardens and admiring the fall colors on the trees. We started to take the long way around the lawn, when I noticed a dog standing some distance away from us, with no human visible nearby, a German shepherd or similar.A closer look showed a couple of other dogs nearby, lying just behind a fence, in shadow.
We decided to be prudent, and walked back the way we'd come. I noticed a woman standing near the path we'd come in on, with a fairly small dog on a leash. I went over to ask her if she recognized the dogs. She didn't, and thought they might be the group of wild dogs that people have seen in the neighborhood occasionally. I'd only heard rumors of them, including signs a while back asking people to donate money so the wild dogs could be spayed/neutered, get their shots, and so on.
She decided to walk over and take a look. Cattitude started after her, so I went with him. We got closer, and saw that there were actually four dogs, with no collars. The one that had been standing started barking, and two of the others stood up.
The woman's dog barked back, and tried to approach the German shepherd, which moved toward us.
We started backing off; the woman picked her dog up and carried it. We again returned to the lawn near the dead-end circle, with Cattitude on my left, away from the dogs. It is agreed between us that I protect him from dogs, though this is the closest I've come to needing to fend off more than over-enthusiastic licking. I walked with him the rest of the way to the subway: however slight the actual risk, part of protecting him from dogs is to provide reassurance.
(Another dog-walker heard our description and said it sounded like the wild dog pack: he told us that he'd seen them three times in the last couple of years, and that they've been reported as far south as 187th Street, in Fort Tryon Park.)
After running some errands, I called the city's all-purpose information and services number, 311. It started by telling me about Election Day, offering numbers to press for more information on voting, and saying that city offices and the public schools were closed, and talking about garbage collection and alternate side parking. "For all other calls, please wait." The agent who picked up seemed unsure about what I wanted, and offered me 911. I explained that this had been an hour and a half earlier, and after taking some notes, she offered to transfer me to Animal Control. Animal Control told me about their Web site and periodically asked me to keep holding. I gave up after a while, since it seemed possible that Animal Control was also closed, and I didn't know whether the dogs were still there.
