On a typical morning, Erica Jones wakes up, eats a hearty breakfast, puts on her running gear and heads for the door.

Along the way she will pick up running partners, but not the typical type. Her cohorts aren’t people, they’re dogs.

Jones, 32, of Harlem, N.Y., is a professional dog runner for Happy Pants NYC one of the numerous dog walking services that don’t just walk dogs, they run them.

“You come in and they’re just knocking stuff over they’re so happy to see you” Jones said of the dogs she runs.

With over 1.5 million dogs living in the city, many being large breeds in small living spaces, many dogs are left with little room to release pent up energy.

But companies like Happy Pants NYC, provide a rigorous work out. Athletes are hired to take dogs on a vigorous 30-45 minute run during the day, a time when they might otherwise sit idle while their owners are at work.

Jones recently moved to the city from California after quitting a desk job in finance, because she really wanted a change of pace, she said.

“This is my full-time job now,” she said with a smile.

Jones said for her, it’s the best of both worlds. She has run in seven marathons, and combining her love of dogs and passion for running seems to suit her well.

“It’s totally perfect, I love running, I love the dogs,” Jones said. “I love being outside, running is easy and fun for me.”

She heard about dog running while still in California, and even tried putting up ads to seek out people who might be interested in having their dogs exercised, but she said it was difficult to find clientele in an area where open spaces were readily available and many people had their own yards for pups to run in.

So immediately after picking up her two dogs and moving across country, she went online and applied for a running position with David Haber’s company, Happy Pants NYC.

“I think the ad said something like, ‘Do you love to run? Do you want to get paid to run? Do you love dogs?” she said.

Checking yes to all those things, she met with Haber and was approved to proceed to the running test.

“He wanted to see if I could run basically,” she said laughing. Not a problem for Jones, who held her own during the 45-minute trial run around Central Park with Haber and one of the dogs.

Haber, 39, from the West Village, worked in marketing for years before starting Happy Pants NYC.
He wanted to try and do something on his own, less structured than his previous corporate jobs, and when he saw dog walkers around the city he’d wonder if it was something he could make a living out of doing.

Then, about four years ago, he began working as a runner for a company that specialized in dog running and did odd jobs on the side to make ends meet.

“After my commitment to them was finished, I basically went off on my own and tried to do something similar,” he said.

Haber combined his long-time love of dogs and his desire to run a business into Happy Pants NYC (“pants” as in the panting a dog makes when it’s happy after a long run).

At first Haber was the only runner, and with clients emerging in areas scattered around Manhattan, he was literally running all over the city.

Now he’s got multiple runners and clients all over the city. His business is doing well, he said. Prices start at $32 for a 30-minute run and clients choose how many visits per week they’d like, ranging up to five 30-minute visits for $115 per week.

“In the beginning it was just me and I was running sometimes up to six or seven times a day,” he said. “I think I was logging like 15 or so miles.”

Haber’s legs were so sore at night, he could barely sleep, he said.

Soon after he began to build a larger clientele, he started hiring runners to help take the load off, he said.

“The key criteria is definitely someone who loves dogs and has a great temperament to them” he said.

It is important that his runners are able to withstand running long distances, which is why he typically hires experienced athletes, but more important to Haber than athletic ability being able to trust them with the dogs.

“We develop such a close bond and relationship with the owners, and their dogs,” he said. “They’re affording us a lot of opportunities and sort of trust to be in their home and take care of their dogs that people value sort of at the same level as their kids,” he said.

One such client who entrusts her pooch about three times a week in the care Haber’s company is Dr. Nina Mohr, a veterinarian at City Veterinary Care in the Upper West Side.

Mohr, 41, from the Flatiron District, owns a yellow mix-breed named Banana. She said he had some behavioral issues before exercise was introduced into his routine. Mohr started running him years ago, but doesn’t have the time to do it as often as she’d like, so about three times a week, one of Haber’s runners at Happy Pants take’s Banana out to run.

She said dog running is a great alternative to dog parks and dog walking, which don’t offer the energy release that running does, especially for working breeds like retrievers and schnauzers, whose natural instincts are to be moving and working.

“They’re in an apartment, they sleep when we’re gone, they don’t do anything,” she said.

As a result, dogs do sometimes develop behavioral and even medical issues like arthritis and weight problems, but those who can get enough exercise, usually see improvement in these areas, she said.

“I think there are tremendous benefits, cardiac benefits, orthopedic, all kind of things,” she said.

Mohr believes strongly in exercise for dogs. Not only does she recommend running and other forms of exercise to patients, she also swears by it with her own pooch.

At 11 years old, Banana is still in great health and has the spirit of a young pup, Mohr said.

“Before I started running with him, he was sort of more destructive, “ she said. “He had separation anxiety.”

But the running has mellowed him out, she said.

Republican Primaries in Bay Ridge Brooklyn By Shara Talia Taylor from Pavement Pieces on Vimeo.

After being booted out of Zuccotti Park last weekend, after a six month occupation, Occupy Wall Street protestors have moved to a public space – Union Square Park – leaving the community with mixed reactions.

OWS plans on growing the number of protestors at the park, a favorite spot for workers, tourists, students and community residents. The protestors plan on using the park as the launch for weekly marches around the city.

City dwellers step off the train at Grand Army Plaza in Brooklyn with comfortable shoes and an appetite. On the menu are some of Prospect Park’s most hearty weeds, young flowers and roots.

These foodies came to Brooklyn recently to experience a taste of what grows in the 585-acre park. They are urban foragers for a day. Boldly pulling at flat green plants with tender leaves matting much of the area’s recently frozen dirt, they dust off the leaves on their jeans and indulge.

Forgoing Park Slope’s famous organic cuisine, water-boiled bagel shops and family-friendly Greek fare, people are here to discover what edible leaves are free for the taking—and eating.

Urban foraging is a unique way to eat locally. Foragers look for edible weeds, non-toxic mushrooms and colorful trees that bear fruits such as American persimmons — a deliciously sweet yellow or orange-tinged fruit with a tough skin, packing juice.

One man who knows where to locate these free juice bombs is “Wildman” Steve Brill.

He is “America’s go-to guy for foraging.” In his 60s, he’s been leading urban forages for decades since his first tour in 1982.

“I didn’t have the beard or the hat, and people said ‘you don’t look like a wildman’ so I went to the Army-Navy store,” he said. “I bought the hat and grew the beard and people said ‘you look like just what I though you were going to look like.’”

He gives off the aura of Sir Nigel Archibald Thornberry—the cartoon wildlife documentarian and nature expert—on the popular ’90s Nickelodeon show “The Wild Thornberries.” The two share a love for safari garb, the environment and for their daughters.

Brill drove to his Brooklyn tour from his home in Connecticut on a recent chilly morning. His daughter Violet, named after the purple flower that is “always tasty” to great outdoors lover, is his assistant. He jokes that she will take over the business. At 7, she can already identity many species of plants, mushrooms and more.

This was Brill’s first tour of his 30th year foraging. Tours still start in March and end in December.

Brill started off by leading the troop of 20 people to a green patch of chickweed growing alongside a fence.

Runners jogged by the walking path where tour-goers huddled, taking turns kneeling to see the small plant that Brill describes as having five trademark parted flowers. Common chickweed grows all year long, thriving in sunny, partially shaded areas.

Fun fact courtesy of Brill: chickweed gets its name because chickens love to nibble on it.

It’s considered a common weed in the U.S., but chickweed capsules as a relief for eczema, coughs, rheumatoid arthritis, weight loss, support fat digestion, cellulite and much more.

Most of the urban foragers were first timers, but none hesitated to eat clumps of chickweed.

“It tastes like corn on the cob,” Brill said.

More like the cob itself, according to the scavengers.

Brill offers tons of information about each plant and injects historical knowledge into each lesson.

“The herbalist would give them chickweed,” he said. “It has more vitamins than a health food store. They would very quickly rebuild their strength.”

Brill usually leads tours through tri-state area’s most wild areas, like Central Park, Inwood Hill Park, Queen’s Alley Pond Park, the Appalachian Trail and Tarrywile Park in Danbury, Conn.

As a nature guide, he helps reconnect urbanites with their green surroundings.

Despite the long histories and scientific facts about plants, it’s not all serious. There are a lot of jokes and sweet treats. For each tour, he brings baked goods or ice cream he’s made from ingredients on urban forages. He brought small chocolate truffles to this tour, made with “coffee essence” from Kentucky Coffee Tree seeds — definitely not Starbucks seeds.

Gary Levingston, from Lindenhurst, Long Island, didn’t know what to expect on the food tour of the park, but walked away with a full bag of field garlic, chickweed and common evening primrose roots.

“Hopefully it will never come in handy,” Levingston joked. “It’s interesting to know and pass on.”

Victoria Gershik, from Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn, looked forward to making Sassafras tea — boiling a gallon of water with the root — and possibly Sassafras jello.

“This is the first time I’ve been done a tour with him,” Gershik said. “Learning about plants, it’s just so much fun.”

Many of the day’s foragers said they would be back for more free greens and natural edibles.

“This was a very good start to my 30th year,” Brill said.