800 households have difficulty sleeping; over a hundred pet dogs "party" every night
Men and football, please stay away and don't disturb the sweet dreams. This might be the greatest wish of homebody women during the World Cup.
"Now we also need to add the dogs," said residents of Juzhou Xinyuan Relocation Neighborhood on Dongfanghong Road in Hexi, Changsha. In this neighborhood with 800 households, there are over a hundred dogs. As soon as it gets deep into the night, they act as if they've consumed some stimulant and start howling collectively or go outside for their "parties." Grandmother Wang, who is 80 years old and lives in the neighborhood, was woken up again on the evening of June 17th.
Dogs partying every night
Summer has arrived, the weather has heated up, and people tend to come out at night to cool off, just like the dogs do. Every evening around five or six o'clock, one dog after another strolls out from their owners' homes. They gather in groups of three or five, playing and frolicking together, looking quite content. And this is exactly the rush hour for people getting off work or school. Even the braver men can't help but feel afraid when they see those big, muscular dogs and try to detour around them. The children are even more scared.
The residents say that these dogs are different from those in other places—they're all true "night owls." If you can still avoid the dogs on the road, then there's absolutely nothing you can do about them at midnight. When people have fallen asleep, the dogs seem to have consumed some unknown stimulant and inexplicably start fighting, emitting cries of pain, waking people from their dreams with these sounds.
Mr. Xu, the manager of Yuxin Property Company at Juzhou Xinyuan Relocation Neighborhood, said that all the residents are relocation households from Yinpengling and Guansha岭 in Hexi Pioneer Zone. Many dogs moved along with their owners. The neighborhood has 1044 households, and now over 800 have moved in, bringing with them over a hundred dogs, almost none of which are registered or vaccinated. Some people even brought chickens and ducks, and more and more people are starting to keep dogs.
Residents living in fear
"In just this month, three people have been bitten by dogs. We receive complaints from residents every day, but we don't have enforcement authority, nor can we take the dogs away. All we can do is issue notices to persuade, but it doesn't work," Mr. Xu said. The property management company has repeatedly asked the police station and the urban management department to mediate, but they also claim that there's no way to solve the problem.
"This depends on the residents being conscious. They should either send away those unregistered, unvaccinated dogs or register and vaccinate them, and strengthen supervision in daily life," an officer from Lugu Police Station said. With summer vacation approaching, so many dogs roaming around in the neighborhood pose a great danger to children, and parents should pay extra attention to safety.