Jan

24

I always thought dogs were angels too, and trained hard many years in veterinary school to heal them.

However, certain dogs in certain countries, depending on the people that influence them, in one month turn from angels to snarling demons. I learned a lot in the past seven months fighting about eight dog packs of 5-10 animals each by being surrounded by them all snapping within four feet – front, back, and either side.

The best thing to do is to back into a corner. Otherwise the fastest alpha will sprint around and try to hamstring you by biting in the rear. It's impossible to watch 360 degrees, so if one is encircled without any plan or mental rehearsal, blood is sure to flow. Yours.

It's exactly the same technique I watched on a National Geographic film of packs of 6-10 wolves each taking down caribou, deer, elk or even bison in Alaska. Unless the prey can outrun the predators (not me any more), or back into a corner so there is no real side or rear attack, or grab a weapon, then one is at the mercy of the canines.

This never happened to me, though I was bitten biweekly by the Peru Amazon street dogs in various haunts where I walk. The two primary fighting techniques were to pick out the alpha (usually the biggest male), and charge it ignoring the attempted nips from the rest. Once you kick the alpha in the teeth and he whines, the rest retreat. In the common case of the fastest dog running around end to get behind you, I always turn and immediately chase it trying to kick it. You need to get to it fast because as you turn to face it the rest of the pack rushes your heels. That dog is the fastest, usually the bravest, and once it zips off the rest will follow its lead away from your body.

Once I got these strategies down, I actually looked forward to the afternoon or night workouts of fighting off the packs after a long stint at the 'office', and it was restful before going to bed.

Sad to say for a veterinarian, I resorted to psychological warfare to turn the tide to keep from going psychologically rabid myself. I knew the dog alpha of each of the eight packs in a blink at a block's distance; it was usually the biggest male, but nearly as often the stupidest which is to say most fearless, like pit bulls and bulldogs. My psych warfare was to stalk them during their sleep, especially during a night rainstorm, and kick them directly in the cranium. If you kick in the eye, ear, nose or teeth it can cause permanent damage, but I only wanted to establish myself as their dominant. My foot made hard contact about twenty times over the months with the various sleeping alphas, as hard as football punts, but their heads are so hard that it was like kicking a 8" diameter rock. I alternated feet over the weeks waiting for the soreness to go away. I have no toenails left on either of my big toes from this.

Then the psychological part comes into play – a hard head kicked sleeping dog awakes instantly and instinctively turns and bites at the foot. There's a split second to kick a second time with the same, or better, the opposite foot, and about one second after your first kick the animal registers pain, the eyes dull, and it withers off yelping in pain with a tucked tail. Now is the time to follow it through the rain for blocks, not letting it lie down, rest or sleep for about thirty minutes. It's easier than you think because every alpha returns to the same spot after a few minutes, so I just lay in wait, as they have done with me, and keep them awake and moving. It's a combination of pain and sleep deprivation, and after a few nights of this, without fail, the alpha will no longer lead the pack in attack. Instead, when it sees me coming, it lowers the head in a cowering gesture and sulks off, followed by the rest.

That's the time to be on the alert for attacks from street people, who live like them, and empathize in bands. I know this from hundreds of encounters with the same packs in the past few months in the Amazon where the dogs have turned nasty with a sudden rise in consciousness of the people who now treat the dogs like second, instead of equal, citizens.

These are the techniques to beat fallen canine angels. And they worked on people too.

Pitt T. Maner III suggests: 

These high frequency deterrents called zappers work fairly well and could be easily shipped to Peru.  At least it would make an interesting study.

Marion Dreyfus writes: 

When I rented a house on a hilltop at End of The World, Zimbabwe, baboons made increasingly aggressive encroachments toward me and the house. I remember saying to the park ranger, who came and shot the baboons dead: "Once they are no longer afraid of people, they will rip your face off. We must kill them to keep that from happening."

Andy writes: 

A recent study on Montana and Wyoming data indicates that killing wolves leads to increased depredation of farm livestock.

One theory proposed is that shooting the alpha breaks the discipline of the pack and leads to more independent wolf breeding pairs. These rogue lone attackers are more likely to predate livestock than an alpha led pack.

The researchers did not find a drop in the depredation until >25% of them were destroyed, which corresponds to their population's rate of increase.

The idea for a rancher is to avoid killing the alpha unless he can and will take out more than 25% of the population of the wolves.
 


Comments

Name

Email

Website

Speak your mind

Archives

Resources & Links

Search