(no subject)
My online friends' pit bulls all seemed to have missed the memo that only pit bulls can kill rats, not those loveable Labs.
(Registration info is "noregistration3," password is "password," or you can read it under
IT was 5 on a crisp morning, and I had just left my building with Missy, my Welsh springer, for her first walk of the day. We headed along 73rd Street toward West End Avenue, turned right on West End and right again on 74th Street.
A third of the way down the block, we encountered a scene that Stephen King might have been proud of. On the sidewalk, next to a pile of shiny black garbage bags, one of which had a gaping rip, was the corpse of a rat the size of Punxsutawney Phil. The rat looked as if it had exploded.
I rushed Missy past the scene, much the way my mother used to drive fast past accidents on the highway, warning us not to look. But of course we were all eyes, as was Missy, who looked over her shoulder as she trotted the rest of the way home, a couple of steps behind me.
A few days later, in the dog run in Riverside Park at 72nd Street, I told a friend about the early-morning mayhem. “Sounds like Oscar’s work,” she replied.
I know Oscar; he’s a Labrador-and-pit-bull mix the color of butterscotch, with a face that’s all innocence. I couldn’t imagine him doing such a horrible thing. It turns out, however, that the pit-bull part of him does do such things, and often in the company of a petite blond Cairn terrier named Paxil.
Both dogs are rescued animals. Oscar was just two hours away from being put down when his owner, Chris Ryan, a lawyer who lives on Broadway near 74th Street, got an S.O.S. from an animal-rescue organization with which he has been active. Linda Fidelman, who is the president of a consultant firm and lives just around the corner, adopted Paxil from a Cairn terrier rescue organization.
The two dogs met late one night two years ago over a rat they were both after, and they’ve been hunting buddies ever since, vigilantes doing their best to rid the Upper West Side of rats.
A few days later I met Ms. Fidelman. I was on my way back from the park with Missy, and she was standing on the corner, Paxil sitting beside her, looking bored. Was it true, I asked, that Paxil was a ratter?
“She sure is,” Ms. Fidelman replied. “And she’s great mouser, too. I once had mice in my apartment, and she had the best time catching them.
“We were out the other night, and she stopped at a trash can near the subway station,” Ms. Fidelman continued. “She was really excited. I took the lid off, and about 20 mice came pouring out. She went crazy chasing them. I think she got about 10.”
As we talked, Paxil appeared to be watching for something, intently. “She looks like she’s waiting for someone,” I commented.
“The street washer,” her owner replied. “She barks at them, we have to wait until it shows up; she’ll follow it for blocks.”
Then she elaborated about the rats. Paxil and Oscar do their hunting late at night, during their last walks of the day. They began their crusade a couple of years ago, when they met in Riverside Park and prey was abundant. Paxil is an expert at flushing rats out of their hiding places. When she does, if they’re small enough, she’ll grab one and shake it until its neck snaps.
But once they’re dead, she has no further interest in them. If the rat is too big for her to lift off the ground, she leaves it to Oscar, whose steel-trap jaws and quickness make short work of the biggest, most intimidating rat.
When their Starsky and Hutch forays into the park began to yield only occasional trophies, the two began to concentrate on the block of 74th Street between West End and Broadway. A construction site where a Bobcat had been excavating deep below a town house had become a source for emerging gangs of rats, forced from lairs in which they’d been ensconced for generations. I’d been catching sight of them nearly every morning for months, watching them slip under the bright blue wooden construction gate. They foraged along the curbs among the stacked bags of refuse, and I’d see them scampering under cars, crossing the street as Missy and I approached.
The morning we saw the exploded rat seemed to signal the end of the boldly scavenging rat population on 74th Street. After that gruesome display, Missy and I saw very few of them. Perhaps it had been a warning. Either they’d moved on to another, safer, neighborhood, or Oscar and Paxil had cleaned up the block.
In the two years they’ve been hunting, Paxil has dispatched nine rats, and mice beyond counting. Oscar’s tally is 22. Not an enormous number altogether, but for them I don’t think it’s as much about exterminating as about hunting. Both have the instinct built into their breeds, and merely follow the urge to do the work expected of them.
I asked Mr. Ryan whether he comes across people who object to Oscar’s activities. On the contrary, he said; Oscar has been cheered for his rat-catching prowess.
Lethal as they may be, both Paxil and Oscar have their goofy sides. For Paxil it’s the street washers. For Oscar it’s vegetables. Once he was seen trotting home with a head of cauliflower in his mouth; he had found it in a pile of refuse in front of Fairway.
Now that West 74th Street is practically rodent free, I hear that Paxil and Oscar have been hunting near Verdi Square. They’re out late at night, when the 72nd Street subway station is quiet, when it is rare to see a taxi or delivery truck along Broadway, and when the rats feel safe enough to come up from the tunnels and the train tracks to enjoy the remains of the day.
Little do they know that Paxil and Oscar are on the job.
(Registration info is "noregistration3," password is "password," or you can read it under
IT was 5 on a crisp morning, and I had just left my building with Missy, my Welsh springer, for her first walk of the day. We headed along 73rd Street toward West End Avenue, turned right on West End and right again on 74th Street.
A third of the way down the block, we encountered a scene that Stephen King might have been proud of. On the sidewalk, next to a pile of shiny black garbage bags, one of which had a gaping rip, was the corpse of a rat the size of Punxsutawney Phil. The rat looked as if it had exploded.
I rushed Missy past the scene, much the way my mother used to drive fast past accidents on the highway, warning us not to look. But of course we were all eyes, as was Missy, who looked over her shoulder as she trotted the rest of the way home, a couple of steps behind me.
A few days later, in the dog run in Riverside Park at 72nd Street, I told a friend about the early-morning mayhem. “Sounds like Oscar’s work,” she replied.
I know Oscar; he’s a Labrador-and-pit-bull mix the color of butterscotch, with a face that’s all innocence. I couldn’t imagine him doing such a horrible thing. It turns out, however, that the pit-bull part of him does do such things, and often in the company of a petite blond Cairn terrier named Paxil.
Both dogs are rescued animals. Oscar was just two hours away from being put down when his owner, Chris Ryan, a lawyer who lives on Broadway near 74th Street, got an S.O.S. from an animal-rescue organization with which he has been active. Linda Fidelman, who is the president of a consultant firm and lives just around the corner, adopted Paxil from a Cairn terrier rescue organization.
The two dogs met late one night two years ago over a rat they were both after, and they’ve been hunting buddies ever since, vigilantes doing their best to rid the Upper West Side of rats.
A few days later I met Ms. Fidelman. I was on my way back from the park with Missy, and she was standing on the corner, Paxil sitting beside her, looking bored. Was it true, I asked, that Paxil was a ratter?
“She sure is,” Ms. Fidelman replied. “And she’s great mouser, too. I once had mice in my apartment, and she had the best time catching them.
“We were out the other night, and she stopped at a trash can near the subway station,” Ms. Fidelman continued. “She was really excited. I took the lid off, and about 20 mice came pouring out. She went crazy chasing them. I think she got about 10.”
As we talked, Paxil appeared to be watching for something, intently. “She looks like she’s waiting for someone,” I commented.
“The street washer,” her owner replied. “She barks at them, we have to wait until it shows up; she’ll follow it for blocks.”
Then she elaborated about the rats. Paxil and Oscar do their hunting late at night, during their last walks of the day. They began their crusade a couple of years ago, when they met in Riverside Park and prey was abundant. Paxil is an expert at flushing rats out of their hiding places. When she does, if they’re small enough, she’ll grab one and shake it until its neck snaps.
But once they’re dead, she has no further interest in them. If the rat is too big for her to lift off the ground, she leaves it to Oscar, whose steel-trap jaws and quickness make short work of the biggest, most intimidating rat.
When their Starsky and Hutch forays into the park began to yield only occasional trophies, the two began to concentrate on the block of 74th Street between West End and Broadway. A construction site where a Bobcat had been excavating deep below a town house had become a source for emerging gangs of rats, forced from lairs in which they’d been ensconced for generations. I’d been catching sight of them nearly every morning for months, watching them slip under the bright blue wooden construction gate. They foraged along the curbs among the stacked bags of refuse, and I’d see them scampering under cars, crossing the street as Missy and I approached.
The morning we saw the exploded rat seemed to signal the end of the boldly scavenging rat population on 74th Street. After that gruesome display, Missy and I saw very few of them. Perhaps it had been a warning. Either they’d moved on to another, safer, neighborhood, or Oscar and Paxil had cleaned up the block.
In the two years they’ve been hunting, Paxil has dispatched nine rats, and mice beyond counting. Oscar’s tally is 22. Not an enormous number altogether, but for them I don’t think it’s as much about exterminating as about hunting. Both have the instinct built into their breeds, and merely follow the urge to do the work expected of them.
I asked Mr. Ryan whether he comes across people who object to Oscar’s activities. On the contrary, he said; Oscar has been cheered for his rat-catching prowess.
Lethal as they may be, both Paxil and Oscar have their goofy sides. For Paxil it’s the street washers. For Oscar it’s vegetables. Once he was seen trotting home with a head of cauliflower in his mouth; he had found it in a pile of refuse in front of Fairway.
Now that West 74th Street is practically rodent free, I hear that Paxil and Oscar have been hunting near Verdi Square. They’re out late at night, when the 72nd Street subway station is quiet, when it is rare to see a taxi or delivery truck along Broadway, and when the rats feel safe enough to come up from the tunnels and the train tracks to enjoy the remains of the day.
Little do they know that Paxil and Oscar are on the job.