feral dogs

世間は天皇誕生日でお休みですが、多くの大学では通常授業です。月曜日代休のあおりで年間３０回の授業時間を確保するための窮余の策です。そういえばこの時間帯、通常であれば学生たちの声で騒がしくなるのですが、今日は静か。Shou-VR*の姿さえ見かけません。まさか...。

'Dogs Have Conquered Romania's Cities'

The deadly attack by feral dogs played out a week ago, and has drawn new public attention to a problem in Romania that has existed for years. Thousands of stray dogs have roamed the country's cities, and they are becoming increasingly dangerous.

In recent days, parents have protested angrily in Bucharest under the motto, "We're not dog food!" Ionut's death is the main story being covered by the Romanian media these days, and it is the subject of a lively debate on Internet forums.

A recent poll shows that three-quarters of Bucharest residents support killing the feral dogs.

The outrage is hardly surprising. The authorities estimate there are several hundred thousand street dogs roaming through Romanian cities and communities, including around 65,000 in Bucharest. The Anti-Rabies Center at the Institute for Infectious Diseases has reported 10,000 people in the capital have been given immunizations after dog bites this year alone. Two-thousand of those patients were children. Last year, 16,000 residents of Bucharest reported being bitten by wild dogs -- 3,000 more than the year before. This recently prompted Romanian journalist Iulian Leca to write, "The street dogs have long since conquered Romania's cities. At night, especially, it is they and not the police who control the streets."

http://abcnews.go.com/International/dog-attacks-romania-put-thousands-strays/story?id=20252168

道ばたにいる犬ではstray dogという表現を思い起こす人が多いと思いますが、feral dogも押さえておきましょう。
ネット辞書の訳ではferalは「〈動植物が〉自然のままの, 野生の(wild)；野生に返った」（Goo）とありますが、ポイントは"feral animals used to live with humans but have become wild"（LDOCE)です。つまり「かつて人に飼われていた犬が野生に戻った」ということです。（UG）

PS むかしオオカミに育てられた少女（アマラとカマラ？）の話を言語学で学び、そのときにferalということばを習いましたが、最近になってこれは真っ赤な嘘だったというような記述を読みました。その真偽はいかに？