Shoot The Dog

The streets have been alive with the sound of gunshot. The police have been accompanying the marksman. The crack of a rifle, and the birds clatter from the trees as though echoing the reverberation of the shot as it rips the quietness. A pause, and then another thunderous bang and more wings flapping in panic.

They have been shooting down the caterpillars, the processionary caterpillars that inhabit the pine trees, destroying the trees and then falling to earth to land on an unsuspecting passing piece of exposed skin. You can see the caterpillars’ larval sacs in the pines like large dew-dropped gossamer nests. The green general-purpose rubbish wheelies are their funeral parlour before burial at landfill.

The destruction of the caterpillar homes does, presumably, have a consensus of support. There are surely no rabid lepidopterists protesting at this elimination and taking cutesy propaganda photos of the little monsters. Which brings me to dogs, and the case of the dog refuge in Palma that is threatened with closure, with the animals being taken to a pound where their lives are likely to be cut short. This has caused a right old fuss, especially among the Brits. And the cause of the Centro Canino has been given an airing in the press, with outraged expats firing off letters to “The Bulletin”. Apparently, some Brits are calling for a boycott by tourists as a protest. If this is the case, it is as futile a gesture as it is preposterous.

Coming soon after the Hamilton incident, some manage to make a link in portraying Spaniards as bullfight-loving, dog-mistreating racists (incidentally, there was a Spanish-led anti-bullfighting protest last week). Of course it is not only the British who are engaged in fighting the closure of the refuge, but you might be forgiven for forming an impression that it was. I am as touched by the doe eyes of a dog being sized up for slaughter as anyone. I am as inclined to the anthropomorphizing of human feelings as animal senses as anyone. But one detects a certain missionary zeal in some sectors of the British expat community. Mistreatment and lack of care of animals are issues here, but they are issues for the Spaniards to sort out without the hectoring of a few expats demanding boycotts. That said, I hope the centre can remain open and continue its good work, as is the case with other such refuges on the island. The motive for the local authority seeking closure of the refuge is that a licence, applied for in September, has not been forthcoming. Quite why this should be seems open to question, but the feeling exists that Palma council would prefer to see the refuge shut. Why? To learn more about the refuge here is a link http://www.centrocaninointernacional.org


QUIZ
Yesterday – Richard Harris. Today’s title – singer, famous, Greekish

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