Take a walk with me ……

http://www.care2.com/c2c/photos/view/202/810229853/Animal_Cruelty/

We are in a small township at the outskirts of Athens, Greece.  Close to Mount Parnitha a wild life preservation. For this we moved here from the beaches of Glyfada. For the green, the trees and the open space. Not only we had this idea, but so had a lot of Athenians over the last year. The trees are cut, the open places are over grown with buildings and Mount Parnitha burned in 2007. Red deer, foxes, hedgehogs and land turtles as well  as many birds have disappeared. But there is still this small area of vegetable fields, olive and wine groves.

It is spring. It is a light overcast cool morning. The snow, unusual to the costal region of Attica, has melted. Field flowers are blooming and so are the fragrant Almond trees.

I take my dog Chiara for a walk and decide - for a change - the fields below the street I live on. Arappi (gr. Black) a Greek Street dog under neighborhood protection I had neutered just 2 weeks ago is following us.   The two are the best of friends.

So we walk along this dirt path, when Arappi goes up the embankment. He shrugs back as he smells something on the ground, advances and then backs off again.

I go up - weary of what I might find…….

He is young. His teeth gleam white in the daylight. His mouth is open, struggling for the last breath of air. Even now in death the chain is taught, bending his neck sickly ever so slight.

The thin chain has been fastened around his neck with wire too thick to be bent with bare hands - you need pliers for that. The chain then fastened to the woven strap or belt we use for tying loads on trucks. The strap higher than the dog around the tree. Just enough for it to lie finally in his last resting place. The tree stands in a small growth of trees, up on the embankment, in the fields below my road, where I live, in Agios Stefanos, by Athens in Greece.

Prior to this event, the black street dog Arappi had been missing twice for 2 to 3 days. He came back with the very same type of strap reeking of petrol tied around his neck and once even  with a length of chain attached to it. He is a street wise dog though and escaped. Then he went missing for a whole week. He was locked into a big cage with a diesel oil tank.  On the petrol soaked  ground his what little dry food he had was strewn in between the wire and metal scraps. No place to lay down flat. His water smelly green. The dog hears me aproach and whines. He scratches the wire cage, bites into it. I break him out. He is with us again.

We fear for him.

Recently at least 20 cats have been doused with petrol or a petrol based substance. They licked it and died miserably.

A dog has been poisoned in the neighbors' garden. He survived the actual poisoning only to die later of the health problems associated with poisons of the 3rd generation.

Somebody had their bunny rabbit stolen from their outside running pen.????

All this happened where I live - and nobody knows what can be done.  The official Greek Welfare Society advised me to contact the media - "…… only if we get exposure we might be able to stop this guy …..". Nobody was interested. The Major's office (pro Stray!!)  informed me that they had numerous calls of people missing their cats or dogs. The asked me:  "What do you think we can do?" I went to the police, they told me to come back tomorrow and bring the pictures (how convenient) on a CD. I will do this tomorrow.

Today I am here - and I am rallying the neighbors. Some of them have dogs and as soon as I approach them they become defensive assuming immediately I am launching a complaint against them. Then they only tell me that they have their animal under control and the poor dog outside of their garden gate and which they feed is "……not ours".

It is Spring- the season of re-birth. Baby lambs are born to be slaughtered for Easter, Kittens are born only to end up in garbage dumpsters, puppies are playing and running around in this exciting new place they find themselves - still unaware they will never eat or drink again.