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Spider and Foxy work it on the Lower East Side

Clayton Patterson and Foxy, left, and Elsa Rensaa and Spider at their Essex St. home. Photo by Dan Levin

BY LINCOLN ANDERSON  |  L.E.S. documentarian Clayton Patterson and his wife, artist Elsa Rensaa, usually wear black, so their two schipperkes are perfectly color-coordinated with them.

Schipperkes (pronounced “skip-per-kee”) are originally from Belgium.

“Schipperkes are working dogs,” Patterson noted. “They used to keep the rats off houseboats.”

“They’re both rescue dogs, so they’re a little bit nuts,” he added.

They got them from a schipperke rescue society. They got Spider, a male who is 13 or 14, first, then Foxy, a female who is 12, a bit later.

Spider is named after tattoo artist Spider Webb. Foxy’s namesake is the pet fox that the late eccentric Australian artist Vali Myers had when she lived in Italy.

Spider tends to be a bit “suspicious,” while Foxy is more “upbeat,” Patterson said.

“They both like to have people sitting down, so there’s no movement,” he noted. “Visitors put them out.”

As for why they adopted schipperkes, Rensaa had one when she was a kid growing up in Canada.

The breed is known for its intelligence and ability to respond to myriad commands — handy when aboard a working barge.

Foxy and Spider, unfortunately, don’t share that trait.

“No, they’re f—— dumb,” Patterson said. “We got them when they were a bit older, so we didn’t train them.”

They don’t even fetch.

“Kvetching, maybe,” Patterson said. “Fetching, no.”

“I have to pick up Foxy whenever I’m sitting down,” said Rensaa. “They make a lot of noise when someone is at the door. They also associate the phone with the door because we don’t have a doorbell. When someone comes by, they must call first — so, phone…door…dog barking.”

They have a black-and-white cat, Mickey, too, also a rescue. Rensaa was sitting on a stoop when a woman came by with a box marked “Animal Control.” Rensaa saw the box move and asked what was inside. The woman explained she was giving the cat to Animal Control, and Rensaa took it.

When Foxy and Spider are near Mickey, it’s “a standoff.”

Before their current dogs, they had another schipperke, Dick. He was named after Dick Le May, a friend of Patterson’s that he grew up with who was a machinist.

“A funny story, Dick was always attracted to and loved black men with dreadlocks,” Patterson recalled. “Elsa would be walking down the street with Dick and all of a sudden a black guy with dreads would be there — and Dick would pull himself over to be petted by that person. His first owner must have been a black guy with dreadlocks. The first owner must have been very good to him.”