DEALING WITH THE DOGS.

Evening Post, Volume XXII, Issue 85, 8 October 1881, Page 3

DEALING WITH THE DOGS.

All dogs, registered or unregistered, out at large without a collar are seized in Auckland. It is usual (says the Herald) for the owners to explain that the collar has been stolen, or simply, taken off to give the dog a run, but such pleading ia of no avail. The dogs are generally kept for ninety-six hours if valuable, but they can be disposed of in forty-eight hours if of no account. At the expiry of the notice applicants can select any of the dogs to be destroyed on paying Is a day for their maintenance, the cost of advertising and collar, or about 10a Gd in all. Tho owner of tho dog, if unregistered, is liable to a penalty of £b, and can be proceeded against by summons. The dog kennels, in which the condemned animals are kept, are two in number, 6 by 5 feet, with doors oa the top, in order to prevent the escape of any when the door is opened for selection. Ihe process used in destroying the dogs is that of drowning, the old system of poisoning by strychnine being found to be dangerous, and sometimes abortive through the dogs throwing up objections to it. A 400-gallon tank being filled with water, the dogs are placed in an iron cage (which is grated at the bottom), and fits easily into the tank, when it sinks steadily to the bottom, being covered by about three inohes of water. In this way a batch of a dczen at a time can be "worked off" peacefully and expeditiously. Mr. t> oldie is somewhat enthusiastic over his patent, and, liko the inventor of the guillotine, o'aima to despatch his vie ims po quietly that they never feel t-oubled over the business. In foot some of the dogs, on being removed from tho submerged cage, have a puzzled expression about the face, as if they bad been treated to a conundrum and had " given it up/ The carcases of the condemned clogs are carted out to a well-known orchard in ' one of the suburbs, where they find a resting ¦placo at the base of the peach trees, the result being, it ia alleged, an increase both in the quantity and quality of the fruit.