Dog caught

I hate to do it, but I must, I must....

Here in our neighborhood, for over a month, a dog has been running loose. He has no collar and no one wants to claim him. Where he came from, no one seems to know. But he has certainly wreaked havoc long enough. I called animal control the first time just before Thanksgiving. This dog had stolen one of my husband's old tennis shoes. He had mowed the lawn for the last time of the year and left his shoes by the door on the front porch until the grass dried (save me a bit of clean up). The next morning, one shoe was missing. After 3 days of not finding it near the house, we tossed the remaining one. Trash pick-up came and went and my neighbor's 8 year old daughter showed up with the missing shoe.

"I think this is your husband's shoe."

"Yes, it is. Where did you find it?"

"My dog, Brownie, must have taken it; it was in our back yard."

"Your dog? He doesn't have a collar, and I have called for him to be picked up."

"Well, he is my dog."

"Then you need to keep him penned up." There is a leash law in the state of Tennessee.

This dog continued to terrorize the subdivision. I stand in my back yard and look across at my neighbor's yard and see 3 different shoes, newspapers, bowls (not dog bowls), and who knows what else strewn all over the place. She keeps her dog, Shelby, in a kennel and this dog, "Brownie" comes and goes as he pleases.

So I approached the mom about it. She doesn't like the dog. He is scared of people and he is eating all of Shelby's food and ruining her yard by bringing in trash and digging holes. If I could get the dog into her kennel and make it stay, we could have it picked up. But he is scared of humans and runs if you venture near him.

The animal control vehicle would drive through the neighborhood and do nothing more. If the dog wasn't in the street, he couldn't be picked up.

Well, I decided now that the holidays are over and the dog is still around, it is time to get the dog out of here.

So I had a trap brought in this morning. The dog sat in my back yard and watched us set it up. Smart dog?

Animal control left and I stuck a turkey leg in the trap. That dog came and circled around the trap several times, stuck his head into it, but didn't step into the trap. Finally, he reached his head and pulled the turkey out without setting the trap closed!

Mind you, I have plenty of turkey left over and I am not spending money on dog food. So I found a smaller piece and placed it in the furthest corner of the trap. It sat out there for 2 hours. The dog would smell of it, try to reach it from the outside of the cage and then give up to take a nap in the neighbor's yard. After 3 naps or so, I had forgotten about the dog, the trap and the turkey.

Just about 15 minutes ago, I heard this awful yelping and I run to the window to see what the dogs were barking about. He fell for it! The dog is in the trap.

Poor puppy, his eyes look at me and ask, why? I wish I didn't have to trap him, but it makes no sense for him to run around here and possibly get killed (not by us, but I have heard some shooting over  the past few days ~ and they weren't fireworks). Or to starve to death, although I don't think that would happen with all the dogs we have in the neighborhood. Hopefully, he will be taken care of at the shelter and maybe someone will fall in love with him, or at least have pity on him and give him a good home. He is a bigger dog, so it may be difficult.