Dogs of Peru

Like South Africa, dogs are everywhere in Peru and very much a part of the landscape here. Somebody told me there are around 2 million stray dogs in Peru and that may be true but I am not sure how anybody would really be able to tell as it is quite normal to let your dog run free here. In that case the dogs are not strays just roamers and nobody uses a collar on their dogs so you can’t really tell when this is the case. There are some pretty sad looking dogs that I'm sure are strays, but then there are also a bunch that may look dirty but seem to be eating enough.

There are a surprising number of breeds here in Peru that I did not expect. I’ve seen Golden Retrievers, Cocker Spaniels, Dalmatians, Chows, German Shepard’, and so on in addition to what are mixed breads. They tend to wander around and mind their own business and unlike dogs in the U.S. that often get attention from people, they rather ignore you. Instead they would much rather root through the piles of trash sometimes left on the side of the road.

Sometimes they don’t take a liking to you and let you know by barking. There was one little dog that got all up in my face while at the Pisak ruins and acted like he was going to bite me. But after I got pissed and yelled at it a bit, then he was my best friend and followed me around for around 30 minutes, go figure. Pedestrians they typically just bark at but cars and bikes they sometimes like to chase. One day I saw what looked like a Golden Retriever chasing a car through traffic in Cusco. Which car I have no idea as there was three lanes of traffic and the street was full at the time but this dog ran with them all the way down the block and out of site.

Here are some of the picts of the dogs I saw while in Peru.

It is spring time in Peru

 

Hanging out under the table in Machu Picchu

 

Dressed up for something

Chilling in the middle of the street