I don’t know about urban areas but in the suburbs and further out it is common for stray dogs to form packs. My father owned a cattle farm and it was not unusual to lose calves to packs of feral dogs. Cattle have been bred to be prey animals by profession so they don’t even put up a good fight. If it wasn’t for their size a pack of dogs would wipe out the entire herd in short order.
I imagine the pack behavior is more common when numbers are useful in providing food, such as bringing down a calf. Where the main food source is scavenged garbage they aren’t really necessary so you may get small groups for companionship etc…
I remember seeing a few strays in moscow, but not often the same one twice. It may be that the life of a stray is rather short, that they have lots being turned out but animal control picks them up rather quickly?
Another possibility is that any pack will be picked up real quickly, but they ignore single stray dogs.
Wouldn’t be surprised…but Fairmount Park is MASSIVE, 9x larger than Central Park & the world’s largest urban park system. That’s a big difference than roaming around downtown Kathmandu.
Wasn’t there a story of a woman killed a couple of years ago in Washington (or was it Jefferson) Park by pit bulls that had been let go and formed a pack? I tried searching the Sun Times and Tribune, but couldn’t find anything.
Not to many big packs of really gone to feral dogs, folk out here got guns but the stray do pack up often.
Once I went up to a pnd in shorts and flipflops to check a water line and did not take a gun as I usually did… Big mistake … a dog pack of about 7-8 came by and most stayed away from me as I just stopped and waited for them to leave. Two did not. Not a stick or rock to be had and I got some growling crfitters advancing on me. I was close nuff to the house to scream for a gun but the wife could not hear me as she was inside vacuming.
They were between me and the house. They stopped and just watched me so I tried to ease away form them and they would advance growling until I stood still again. After a couple of thses, they began to advance slowly and stop, advance and stop. So in desperation I made a sudden and wild screaming charge at them waving my hands etc. I did not think they were going to breake but at about 10 feet, they broke and split away and I made about 100 feet and stopped and turned as I had come to a large stick in the field. I grabbed that and watched as the started towards me slowly. I raised the stick and they stopped so I kept it raised and backed towards the house. Got on the porch, got the door open and grabbed the .22 rifle that was by the door. As soon as the dogs saw me raise the gun to my shoulder, they took off like they knew what a gun was. I missed them but they were a bit of a distance and I don’t think I was too steady anyway.
While I was at that location, about 4 years, I shot 5 dogs, among other critters in theyard, that were traveling in packs chasing the cattle (3) and two that were agressive in the yard.
When I was ten years old, my pony was killed and partly eaten by a pack of stray dogs that got into the barn because the lock on the door had broken (they squeezed in through an opening about one foot wide). When I entered the barn to feed her that morning, I was incredibly traumatized.
The sheriff found the dogs the next day, and shot and killed all five of them.
Good thing you made it to the house before them. My experiences with stray and roaming dogs has been that singly and in pairs they will respond very well to intimidation. I wouldn’t want to have to remind a whole pack that I’m bigger than them.
My point is they wouldn’t NEED to form a pack if they could get enough food singly or in small groups, regardless of their numbers and/or local density.
But I agree with you that Cooper and Rube are probably on the right track.
Need has little to do with it I think. Dogs are social animals and group instinctively. I doubt they get much more food in the city by travelling in packs.
Also they DO form packs in Moscow according to news reports. The OP seems incorrect in his informal survey of Moscow feral dog life.
Well, that was going to be my first reply but I erased it. I doubt an exhaustive scientific survey of the living arrangements of the feral canines in the Greater Moscow metropolitan area has been done by anyone, and anecdotal observations could be deceptive.
German shorthair. 85lbm of muscle, brains, and teeth. Very fit dog - He got a lot of running - I was into sports every season at school, and took him with me when I went running. When he was outside without me, he’d run around the rope-run just for the hell of it.
The doghouse was made of a shipping crate for a tank transmission - 3"x4" oak side slats, and the uprights were even tougher. The box couldn’t be moved except by two strong men - Once Ty backed into the box, the only thing available to bite was his head, which bit back.
Dad, he’s just a seriously deadly shot, and totally calm in danger situations. He went out and unloaded his Colt into the surviving pack members. None of the dogs got more than two lengths from the doghouse.
