Friday, February 18, 2011

A Complaint About Central Park; Dog Bites Hit 5-Year High

In the "Complaint Box" in today's New York Times:
Dogs are welcome at urban parks, but the parks are primarily for people, and while the vast majority of dogs are domesticated, acts of aggression by roaming dogs are, unfortunately, not uncommon.

Yet, some pet owners routinely flout these policies, their lackadaisical attitudes suggesting that the rules are silly if not unnatural and that anxious civilians like me are nothing short of hysterical. Well, I have been pounced upon by dogs during my otherwise cherished runs in Central Park on more than one occasion. The most recent episode involved a dog that stood taller than my five-foot height — he jumped me from behind. His owner returned my stunned gasp with a chuckle and what he thought was a compliment: “Oh, he was just flirting with you!”

Read the whole thing. Nothing that we haven't been saying for years. And it's good that for a change part of the hate mail will be directed to someone else who, from the looks of things, didn't have the sense to write under a pseudonym.

Meanwhile, according to this report from NBC News, dogs bites in 2010 were at a 5-year high. It couldn't possibly be all those unleashed dogs, could it?

Hat-tip to Christina.

1 comment:

Datnioides said...

In 2006 Bob Marino of NYCDOG claimed that off leash dogs were reducing the number of dog bites in New York City. DOH swallowed this claptrap hook line and sinker and granted the lunatic fringe dog owners "legal" off leash hours in New York City parks. Now that everyone and their mother runs their dogs in the parks, anytime and anywhere, and there are more loose dogs running around the parks than ever, why are the dog bite numbers increasing? What happened to all those "tired, happy dogs"? Maybe they aren't so happy any more?