WILD boar in the Forest don't worry me half as much as

some of the dogs people choose to keep.

One of my near neighbours had three Doberman

Pinschers, two of which were put down because they were

killing each other. Take a walk down my lane and you

could easily meet up with one or more free running

Rotweillers that someone seems to be breeding. Recently

a man came by wrestling with something very akin to a Pit

Bull that was trying to attack me in my own garden while

he swore at it shouting "come back Stan".

But on a really bad day you could meet up with one

gigantic animal, the owner battling to control it with a

harness and a chain, which he calls a "German Shepherd".

From the size of it, and the way it bays like a wolf,

I'd say that at least one of it's near ancestors was quite

used to living off Caribou in Canada.

As one who has known the Forest since I first came

here on the "Severn King" in 1944, I am convinced that

these dogs are mainly owned by neurotic incomers, since

Foresters in the old days, wonderful people that they are,

could barely afford to keep a dog.

The other lesson these dog owners seem incapable

of learning is that a dog is a dog, but two dogs are a

pack. ­– David Datta, Joyford.