Mysterious dog cutouts at Fort Totten

From the Times Ledger:

Dogs made of bark that cannot bite have been popping up around Fort Totten to scare off gaggles of geese, but no city agency has yet to come forward to take credit for placing the pretend pooches at the historic fort.

Two wooden dogs sat on the fort’s soccer field, while another stood by its gazebo last weekend. But representatives from the city Parks and Fire departments said their agencies were not employing any methods to hound birds at the fort amid a U.S. Department of Agriculture operation to capture itinerant geese threatening flights at the city’s two airports.

A spokesman for Bayside’s 111th Precinct also said the Police Department was not involved in the matter.

Trish Bertuccio, a spokeswoman for the Parks Department, said the dogs “are there to scare the geese.”

But Vickie Carp, another Parks spokeswoman, said the mutts did not come from the city.

“There is no goose-scaring initiative,” Carp said. “I’ve heard anecdotally that there are some guys who play soccer there who put up some coyotes as a lark. But they don’t belong to Parks.”

She also said fake owls on the docks at Fort Totten Bay were likely in place to scare away pigeons.