By George Psyllides
STRAY DOGS over the weekend killed 83 lambs and injured 12 after entering their pen in the village of Pachna in the Limassol district.
The scene was visited by the veterinary services, who determined that the animals, worth around £4,750, were savaged to death by dogs.
Though not frequent, stray dog attacks against domesticated animals do take place from time to time.
Many attacks occur near the buffer zone and involve stray dogs, who have crossed from the occupied north.
But Senior Veterinary Officer Kleitos Andreou also said such attacks appeared after the first hunting outings.
He said some hunters might take four or five dogs with them and abandon any one they felt did not perform.
” The largest percentage of stray dogs stems from this practice,”Andreou said.
He insisted, however, that dogs, as a rule, did not attack humans unless they felt threatened.
” Usually they will instinctively pray on other animals,”Andreou said.
Andreou blamed the problems on the lack of legislation obliging dog owners to register their dogs with the veterinary services.
A bill, drafted in 1995, has been travelling back and forth from the House to the Interior Ministry because of disagreements among the various groups involved and foot-dragging at the House.
According to the bill, all dogs would have to be registered at a central registry and tagged by the veterinary services.
The owners of abandoned registered dogs could then be easily tracked down and slapped with a hefty fine, Andreou said.
If the dogs caused damage anywhere then their owner would have to foot the bill, he added.
But with an estimated population of 100,000 dogs and no central registry, the situation would continue to spiral out of control, Andreou said.
Existing laws only force owners register dogs with local authorities, but this has proved inefficient, especially in rural areas.
Andreou said the situation concerning diseases was under control, but it would have been better if the bill were passed, as it would force owners to get their dogs checked and there would be a health record for each individual animal.
