Animal Control Division

The Numbers Are Rising

The safety of the human population is my first concern. 

For the past several weeks call' pertaining to wild animals acting strange has increased.  We have receive calls reference to all kinds of wildlife and their behavior.

Yes, Rabies is the first thing that comes to mind to a lot of people. 

Just to give you some ideas of things that may be causing the animal to come to your house.

The first thing is a food source, (cat, dog food bowls, bird feeders, horse feed or event table scraps) left out will draw widelife.  The natural instinct of an animal is to find food and the easiest sources are where they have have found food before.

With the growth in building and clearing land in Polk County, NC, the wildlife habitat is decreasing and the contact with humans is increasing. 

Remember to never try to pet a wild animal, you can not tell by looking if an animal has rabies.  The wildlife population has many different diseases that may cause the animal's behavior to look or act strange or unusual.

In most cases of rabies, the animal will be more aggressive than normal, but there is a dumb rabies that will make an animal act docile. 

Rabies is very serious threat to our safety and must be treated as serious.

An animal can seemingly come out of nowhere and attack and be gone before you have a chance to react.

For example a little 5 year old girl was bitten by a raccoon last Sunday at Harmon Field while playing near the river.  This occurred around 12:45 PM.  Now this precious little girl is going through a series of post exposure rabies treatment.  This is to say the least is hard on her and her parents and everyone involved.

All we can do is protect ourselves by being aware of the dangers and always aware of the surroundings. 

To protect our pets, we must vaccinate for rabies for their safety and to prevent the spread of rabies in domestic animals.

Raphael Foy
Polk County Animal Control