All gone

It looks so eerie, and sad, the quake damage unfixed and the stores all shuttered down. It actually looks very much like the place I used to live, it has that small Japanese town feel. It makes me feel nostalgic and sad.

It actually looks very much like the place I used to live

It looks like every small town that I've ever been through in Japan

My favorite breed of dog, Shiba-Inu. I hope the photographer took him somewhere.

Feel sorry for the Doggie. And yeah it looks like many towns I visited My fav breed of Dogs are still Chow-Chow.

Is the description right that it was taking after the entry-ban was put into place? And if so was the doggie taken out?

... and probably no food is to be found. Poor dog. I bet all these poor fellows are really missing human companionship; they are, after all domesticated.

I hope the doggie was evacuated. No need to leave the poor thing wandering around in a ghost town.

kawachi - Our current dog is a Shiba, and while I love him to bits (now) I don't understand why they're so popular. The very divil to train, destructive, disobedient and bloody-minded. And they shed like nobody's business. Gimme a dobie any day.

Cleo.

You never tried to train a Chow-Chow. Their mind is closest to a wolf, so forget most trainings. But the most loyal and protective breed I ever encountered.

One of ours took 3 Doberman down. But they got a weak heart so few survive past 8yrs.

Agree hope they took the doggie out, I like Shiba but can't stand poodles, german shepards those gone funny in the head due to over-breeding.

Zenny - I imagine a Chow-Chow is a bit like a shiba but more so. Poodles are great dogs - very intelligent, easy to train, fun-loving, clean, don't shed. Trouble is they look cute, and people who go for cute-looking dogs tend to concentrate too much on what the dog looks like and not what's inside. Poodles are good, your average poodle owner mind...

We had German Shepherds back in the UK when I was a teenager - we called them Alsatians then because it was too soon after the war for anything with German in the name to be popular. Again, great dogs - intelligent, easy to train, good to look at, great guard dogs. As you say though, the breed seems to have suffered from over-breeding, and hip dysplasia is a real problem. And they shed, too.

Can't beat a dobie - good-looking, intelligent, obedient, loyal, affectionate, great guard dog, minimum shedding and maximum fun and companionship.

cleo.

I think we got a different idea of intelligents. IMO you can't train an animal if it is intelligent as it will decide what it wants to do and won't do tricks for a treat. Tried riding a cow?

But agree doberman are great dogs and great with kids, way better than a St bernard(which shouldn't be close to kids).

Enjoy your dogs all I got are 2 wabbits right now.

Moderator: Back on topic please.

poor dog

Proud whippet owner myself. I live in a house, but they also make great apartment dogs: they never bite or bark, are friendly with strangers, are happy to sleep most of the time (their nickname is 50kph couch potatoes), and their short, single-layer coat makes shedding no problem (as my asthmatic daughter would attest.)

I do wonder what these poor, abandoned dogs are thinking, though. Suddenly, all - ALL! - the humans have disappeared! Must be something out of the Twilight Zone for them.

If it's an evacuation zone what the heck is a camera type person doing taking pictures there?

Poor guy. I hope he's ok.

That place looks actually "better" than many streets in Inaka-Japan, not so run-down: store fronts cluttered with boxes, bicycles/trucks parked ridicilously, trash around the electricity poles...

Zenny11 - grew up with a Rottweiler as family dog, loved her. Can't believe German law classifies them as fight-dogs, must have muzzle now and no kids allowed to walk them! Want to get a boxer or white shepherd some day.

IMO you can't train an animal if it is intelligent as it will decide what it wants to do

No, a dog can understand what it's being asked to do (=intelligent) and decide not to do it (=bloody-minded). That's my Shiba.

Our other, older, dog is not intelligent in that she has always had trouble understanding. Ask her to sit and you could see the cogs whirring inside her tiny brain while she stared hard at you and tried to remember what Sit means. Once she did remember her bottom was on the floor toot sweet. She has always had a lovely sweet temperament though, and that more than makes up for what she lacks in the trainability stakes.

Wabbits is good, too. Can you train them?

They showed on the telly tonight scenes inside a cow shed and a pig farm inside the evacuation area. Mostly still bodies lying on the ground. Heartbreaking. Also a dairy farmer in the soon-to-be evacuation zone, desperately phoning round trying to find somewhere to send his cows. He was almost in tears. God (for the earthquake and tsunami) and Tepco (for the nuclear mess) have an awful lot to answer for.

@cleo- i actually watched my dog have a cognitive dream about her bone. She was a black lab (the everyman dog) and her mouth was chewing and her legs kicking. Suddenly she woke up, looked around and walked right out of the room and into the kitchen and returned with her bone. Of course dog lovers have a million stories but this was human. I mean- REALLY human.

"what the heck is a camera type person doing taking pictures there?"

I wondered that for a second too until I remembered the cameramen rushing past the posted warnings at the volcano in Kyushu a few months ago.

The creation of a large no go zone is definitely a rare newsworthy event in modern Japan. News photographers and reporters are probably not going to get charged for entering the zone. The constitution and Article 21 forbidding censorship hasn't been suspended.

I really hope the last farmers to go do actually find somewhere to house their herds for a time. This evacuation is so dam brutal and could be better organized. The amount of livestock being starved to death or shot for no good reason, (but for the sake of expediency) in this bad situation is insane.!! I know that people nationwide have raised enough money, and arranged to float hundreds of horses from the Fukushima region up to Hokkaido (offering free accom), and many horses from riding clubs, farms and race-training farms have been collected by volunteers, only to be stopped short just outside of the 30km zone and either sent back (or worse) simply because if there are no papers to prove the have had their yearly shots...they cannot leave the area. This kind of insane bureaucracy....gets up my goat so badly!!

No one really cares about the intelligence/cuteness etc. of these pets in these grime times. People discussing their qualities and merits here are wasting their time. They are ALL going to die a slow and very painful death - and the one in the photo is already suffering.

Do the humane thing Japan - like the Russians did - send in the troops and shoot them all before they die in agony. I am certain everyone agrees.

"I am certain everyone agrees."

Yes, everyone agrees how ridiculous your statement and proposition is.

Nuclear power has two sides - good and bad. This dual crises has confirmed how to develop alternative energy sources to meet the basic standards of safety and renewable conditions. Sci-fi movies have depicted many stores about death cities polluted or contaminated by chemical and nuclear weapons. With the more-than-20-km no-go zone, we can believe all houses and lands in this radius is considered as the death zone for at last five to ten years. This story may force the government to disconnect the cozy relationships between top-rank officers of ministries and dominant industrial corporations. Even Japan has more reasons to run politics and business by its own ways, but it has cost the nation too much. Nobody can afford to pay that price.

shoot them all before they die in agony.

Better still, bring them out and give them a chance at life.

I am certain everyone agrees.

Actually no not everyone agrees, I agree with cleo too. Give them a chance at life.

Using your logic I would guess that shooting all the folks in the evacuation centers would be the humane thing to do. It's easy, saves a ton of money, and could be seen as the "humane" thing to do. (To those that don't get it, I am being REALLY sarcastic!)

Cleo and Yubaru - as an animal lover myself, that would be a perfect solution. However, this is Japan, and we all know they WONT be released/cared for. The residents are not allowed to pick up their pets. These animals are all going to die - unless you guys want to risk arrest by breaking in and feeding them? I'm afraid the ONLY humane solution is to shoot them all to prevent suffering.

BurakuminDes, I personally believe that if for no other reason than the health and well being of humans, it is possible that some if not many or all of these animal's may very well be sick as well, should if found to be so, euthanized, but not by being shot. There are other ways besides shooting them.

So whatever was the fate of this lonely Shibainu?

Bunrakumin, Just for the record, don't you ever assume you speak for me with a "I'm sure everyone agrees".