Every Tuesday and Thursday, we run down what’s going on in local Internet discussion groups.

Truxton Circle
Over in Truxton Circle, dog owner martyb complains that “a crazy, and very brazen bird has been attacking my dog. This territorial bird stalks the area in front of Dunbar HS on New Jersey.” On June 8, he writes, it “swooped in and hit my dog’s backside, grabbing with his claws and hitting with its wings.…then it just flew away, swooped back in a couple of times, and my dog and I got the heck out of there! It felt like a Hitchcock film.…” Other Truxton folks offered up not only their own bird-bites-dog stories, but solutions that could both eliminate such birds and encourage the most apathetic residents of the area to participate in the problem-solving. “I’m ready to talk to one of our friendly neighborhood drug dealers and ask them to shoot that durn bird for us?” says TruxtonResident. “Another reason to repeal the ban on hand-guns in the District so honest citizens can defend themselves against these terrorizing bird attacks!” says NstNW, careful to note the comment is a “(joke).” “LOL…they can barely hit each other!” says saibot. “How are they going to hit something the size of a phone? Maybe they can trick the bird into eating a little crack.”

Brookland
Brookland resident Janet has invited all of her neighbors to a feral-cat adoption fair. On Father’s Day, she discovered “4 kittens living under the deck in our backyard. We want them out sooner rather than later. We have no idea if the cat is wild or not and our son plays out back and I don’t want him or anyone to be confronted by an angry mother.” The Humane Society could get the kitties from beneath the deck, she says, “but will not ‘keep’ them.” Those interested can even watch the kitties in action—just don’t get too close. “If you are interested please know you are welcome to come by in the evening and watch them play from our bedroom window.”

shepherdpark
Mark is being bothered by a bird making a racket. The feathered foe first “rat-a-tat-tatted” on his chimney cap in the spring, and last week it started making bird calls as well. “This bird, about the size of a YOUNG crow, has a black head on top and a long black bill, but otherwise has smooth, gray feathers.What kind of bird is it, and does anyone have any ideas how to get him to go away from our chimney?” Replies adthomas, “How about sending some electrical current up your chimney stack – or is that not PC according to PETA?” But before shock therapy can begin, J. rushes in to say that evicting the bird would not only be inhumane but cockblocking, too. “What you have is a northern flicker. It is adapting its mating ritual call to the urban environment,” he writes. “It is trying to make as much noise as possible to attract females and it has learned that rapping on a metal item such as a chimney cap is a good way to make a lot of noise!…So next time you hear it you should wish him luck in his courtship!”