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A question asked by a visitor to Barga this week made O'Connor
get out his camera and go out to see if he could find some
answers.
The question? Just what are all those bottles of water doing
on the doorsteps in Barga Vecchia?
The bottles are there to stop cats or dogs peeing on the doors.
SO how does it work ? So far there have been 7 answers put
forward:
1) the dog/cat sees his/her reflection in the bottle and is
scared off
2) the dog/cat is afraid of water
3) the dog/cat gets a small static charge off the bottle
4) the shadow of the bottle frightens off the dog/cat
5) the dog/cat knocks over the bottle as he/she lifts their
leg and is scared off
6) The owner of the dog/cat sees the bottles and thinks the
water is poisoned
7) sunlight on the water creates a frightening sparkling light
None of these answers seems to "hold water" but
people in Barga Vecchia insist that the bottles do actually
deter cats and dogs and even go so far as to claim that the
green bottles work best So just where did this idea come from
? Nobody knows. So is it just yet another urban legend?
Digging around a bit more brings up a suprising piece of evidence
to support the claim and once more brings the Scottish connection
to the fore:
In Scotland there was the habit of standing half filled plastic
bottles (with the tops off) in fields around the chicken pens
to keep the foxes away. The Scottish wind makes a whistling
noise as it blows across the open bottles kept the foxes at
a discreet distance.. Maybe, just maybe the idea was transplanted
here and got mixed up on the way as the tops got screwed down
and the wind factor was ignored.... just that nobody bothered
to inform the cats and dogs of Barga marking out their territory.
If
you have any other suggestions or stories about keeping cats
and dogs on their toes or would like to make a comment on
this article, then click
here
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