Allyson Halm

‘It’s a Futile Act’: Animal Control Voices Concerns After State Issues Permit for Trapping in New Canaan

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State officials on Wednesday issued a permit for a nuisance wildlife control officer to trap animals in southwestern New Canaan, prompting the head of Animal Control to voice concerns about the practice. The Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection Wildlife Division issued the permit to a trapper for the area of Adams Lane, according to a Sept. 25 call log at the New Canaan Police Department’s Animal Control section reviewed by NewCanaanite.com. The call log didn’t specify which property owners sought the permit. State officials could not immediately be reached. Last month, an Adams Lane dog was snatched by a coyote and killed, days after a Labrador retriever sustained what are suspected to be coyote bites in a yard on nearby Knapp Lane.

Police: Coyote Snatches Adams Lane Dog

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Animal Control officials are urging residents on the west side of New Canaan to be alert after two coyote versus dog incidents this week, including one where a Chihuahua mix was taken. On Monday, a resident of Knapp Lane reported that a Labrador retriever sustained puncture wounds to the inside of a back thigh after two coyotes were sighted in his yard, according to Officer Allyson Halm, head of the New Canaan Police Department’s Animal Control section. On Thursday, a man on Adams Lane put his two dogs out in the yard while he went briefly to his garage and then heard a commotion, Halm said. He watched two large coyotes snatch his 13-pound white Chihuahua mixed-breed dog and run off through the woods, Halm said. The man chased but was unable to keep up with the coyotes, and believes his dog was already dead in the animal’s mouth, she said.

Animal 411

New Canaan Girl Bitten by Dog During Playdate

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A husky-type dog on Journeys End Road bit a New Canaan girl on both legs during a play date last month, prompting treatment at hospital emergency room, police said. The victim’s father contacted Officer Allyson Halm, head of the New Canaan Police Department’s Animal Control section, on the afternoon of  June 21, about one hour after an Alaskan Klee Klai bit the girl, according to an incident report obtained by NewCanaanite.com through a Freedom of Information request. The dog, named ‘Stryker,’ was outside with the children when the girl began to run and the animal “began to chase and nipped the child,” according to the report, citing information from Stryker’s owner. The owner, mom of the girl hosting the play date, washed the area of the wounds and put a Band-Aid on it, the report said. Under state law, dogs who bite people on their own property must undergo a 14-day quarantine, and it can be completed at home.

Allyson Halm

Police: Dog Whose Owner Is ‘Against Over-Vaccinating’ Bites Pool Guy

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An 8-year-old cockapoo lacking a current rabies vaccine bit a man servicing a Dan’s Highway pool last month, police said. The dog, Chester, bit the pool man on both legs on June 17, prompting him to seek medical attention at New Canaan Urgent Care, according to a police report obtained by NewCanaanite.com through a Freedom of Information Act request. 

According to the report, when police contacted Chester’s owner, the Dan’s Highway woman “indicated she was aware of the incident and confirmed that her dog did not have a current rabies vaccine because she was against over-vaccinating her dog.”

The author of the report—Officer Allyson Halm, head of the New Canaan Police Department’s Animal Control section—said she learned of the bite from the pool man’s father, who had contacted the dog owner’s South Salem, N.Y.-based veterinarian and learned that Chester didn’t have a current rabies shot. The dog had been previously vaccinated with a three-year shot in September 2012, the report said, and had a titer shot done in February 2016, “which indicated the dog was protected,” Halm said in the report. Halm advised Chester’s owner that the dog would need to be quarantined in a licensed facility, with a release date of June 23. However, the dog’s owner in seeking to board the animal “was declined several times because of the dog’s vaccine status,” Halm said.

Animal 411

‘It’s a Death Sentence’: Four Young Ducks Dumped at Mead Park, One Appears To Have Died

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Police say one of four young domesticated ducks that someone appears to have dumped July 4 at Mead Park did not survive its first weekend there and that a New Canaan woman has agreed to let the remaining waterfowl rehabilitate on her private property. Officials learned about the abandoned ducks July 9 when one of the tennis pros at Mead reported that the birds had been walking up to park visitors as though seeking food and water, according to Officer Allyson Halm, head of the New Canaan Police Department’s Animal Control section. 

Responding to the park, Halm found the ducks to be “in some distress” and “very thirsty,” and after consulting with authorities at the nonprofit organization Wildlife in Crisis learned that a person had been seen releasing the animals at Mead the prior week. They likely were mail-order mallards or else baby ducklings that had been found by a family and raised in a home “until they didn’t like them anymore,” Halm said. “They have zero defense knowledge or flight drive, no survival skills,” Halm said. 

Though the three surviving ducks appeared to be grazing at Mead, “the problem was that they did not go into the pond—they didn’t recognize the pond as a safe haven,” she said. Yet the ducks when shown a water bowl hopped into it to swim, Halm said, indicating that they’d been domesticated in the past.