Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, July 23, 1993 TAG: 9307230065
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: RON BROWN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
As the Southeast Roanoke girl would play on her swing set in her fenced-in back yard, Alyx would jump up and scratch her.
"Alyx hurt me," the little girl would cry to her parents.
That's a scenario William and Erin Woods couldn't take a chance on anymore.
Alyx was destroyed this week after a skunk that attacked it tested positive for rabies.
It was the first time this year that a domestic animal in Roanoke has been destroyed because of contact with rabies. Two rabid raccoons were killed after being found in the city earlier this year.
Animal control officials worry that infected animals are inching ever closer to populated suburban and urban areas, posing greater threats to unvaccinated domestic animals such as Alyx.
The Woods gave Alyx to Krystal on Christmas Eve, after the family cat was attacked by a dog and had to be destroyed.
"We don't have very good luck with animals," Erin Woods said Thursday.
On Monday morning as she looked into her back yard, she noticed the skunk playing with Alyx in the yard.
"She [Alyx] would run up and grab it by the tail," William Woods recalled. "Then she would jump back."
The skunk amused itself by playing with a stuffed toy, which had been left in the back yard for Alyx's amusement.
Soon, the puppy and the skunk were romping in the back yard.
"I thought it was funny," William Woods said. "They were out here chasing each other around."
As he left for work, William Woods told his wife that she might want to call the city's animal control officers to have the skunk removed.
"The lady said it was playing with the dog and wouldn't leave," said M.W. Rock, an animal-control supervisor.
When Officer B.L Thomas walked into the back yard, the skunk and the dog still were playing. Suddenly, the skunk attacked Alyx.
The skunk bit the puppy's back legs then turned on Thomas, who clubbed the skunk with a tree branch he found in the yard. He thought the skunk was unconscious, but it started coming at him again.
This time, Thomas picked up a 2-by-6 board and killed the skunk. The animal's head was removed and taken to the lab for testing. The skunk tested positive for rabies.
Meanwhile, Alyx was confined to the back porch of the house. If she was in the yard, she had to stay chained to a tree.
Officials told the family she faced a possible six-month quarantine and still could carry the rabies virus. Like any puppy, she liked to burrow beneath the wooden fence in the back yard. The holes she left beneath the fence may have allowed the skunk to get to her.
With a baby due any day, the Woods decided that having the dog around presented too much of a risk. They told Krystal that the skunk was sick when it bit Alyx, making Alyx sick.
The little girl still doesn't appear fully aware that her puppy is gone.
William Woods said there's heartache in the way the dog died.
"There's no more barking or scratching at the door," he said. "She had a beautiful coat."
Memo: ***CORRECTION***