So much dog poo - what can be done?

[AntiDogPooBrigade]

Fines aren't working. Dog wardens are nowhere to be seen. Increase in dogs has meant a huge increase in the amount of poo on our pavements and in our parks. I am beyond fed up of it.

We need to do something. But what?

And before the dog people pile on saying it's only the minority, it's only a few, they've never seen dog poo on the pavement, I attach EIGHT photos from this morning alone, that I took on a small stretch of road where my DC go to school. I have reported this street to the council, as it is prolific here, and they cleaned it on Friday. So all this poo is fresh from sometime after Friday afternoon, to now. And it is not just one dog.

No, with horses it’s usually on the road and not pavement and verges. It’s not that nice but it’s not common anymore like it used to be, and they aren’t meat based so less disgusting, easier to see and avoid too. We don’t say there are too many horses because of droppings. Agree, stick it on the garden!

I'm with you on a licensing fee, absolutely.
Dogs are, after all, a luxury - not a right.

I just can't get het up about a dog doing its business outside, where I'm sure a number of other animals have also been - and humans do also very frequently go to the bathroom outside, we might frown upon it but it does happen. Not so much grown women, but I guarantee the men in your life will have done at some point. And did you children never have a nature wee?

@AntiDogPooBrigade

It's worse in Spain in my opinion, i could not believe how disgusting the streets in Madrid specifically were last time I was there

I've never seen it so bad in our village as it is now. I counted 8 separate piles of poo in a short stretch of pavement a few weeks ago.
I was in the small town where DS lives at the weekend and it was the same there. Heaven help anyone who is visually impaired or walking in the dark.
Whenever it's mentioned on Facebook there's always hundreds of dog owners claiming they always pick up after their dogs. Funny that all these dog owners out walking their dogs never spot anyone not cleaning up after their mutt
There's a large common nearby where lots of dogwalkers go to exercise their dogs. I no longer go there as a) people let their out of control dogs run off the lead and b) there's dog sh*t everywhere. It's supposed to be a nature reserve! Ruined by irresponsible dog owners.

There definitely needs to be a reintroduction of the dog licence at a significant fee to pay for the impact of dog ownership.

Yes, my kids had a nature wee, in a bush, but we are talking probably a handful of times per kid (I have two), in an emergency. I think that is a tolerable amount, considering animals do pee there too. It's not the same as pissing several times a day up lampposts on the pavement par for the course.

I am not at all against animals doing their business in the wild, and obviously we probably do have rats and foxes leaving their excretions on the pavements, but the sheer volume of dog mess is at disgusting levels, and I really do think that as a civilised nation, we shouldn't find it acceptable on any level.

I am intolerant of dog poo on pavements because my little one is a full time wheelchair user, if his chair goes through dog poo we can't just leave it at the front door and hose it off like we could his shoes, his chair is his independence.

We have a lovely small green opposite our house, it is not quite the village green, but serves our little area. NO kids play on it, because it is used as a dog toilet. It is known locally as Poo Green. I sometimes have to park across the green if I can't get parked by my own house, and rather than cross the green, I walk all the way round because the pavements, shitty though they are, are still a safer bet than that green. Time was, the kids would be playing on that green, being neighbourly, swinging in the tree. Now, not one. Because we all know the whole area is a pile of dog poo.

I am sorry to hear that. That really really sucks. Was bad enough when we'd get it on the pram or scooter wheels.

Wow that’s amazing how did they find her? I love you got her fined! What an idiot.

Walked past it three times today. I report it on a council website but nothing happens and no one clears it up

I feel very lucky then that our council have been out cleaning it when reported (not immediately though). I would contact your MP. I have contacted mine to highlight how much of a problem it is. I really think we need change and big action on this issue.

But if a bin isn't available, the shit should taken home and disposed of in your own bin, not just left!

I agree OP. Same round my way, it's disgusting and so irresponsible. My young GC went down a slide last summer in the park, straight into a pile of dog shit on the ground in front of the slide. Now who would leave that in a children's park? Vile

That is appalling, poor kid. Yuck.

Good idea. I will do that actually! Because all ours do is monitor it. They don’t clean it up it’s probably pointless me even reporting! They stick signs up on the lamppost about fines but it’s not like there is anyone to bloody catch them!

I take mine home if there's no bin, luckily where we go there are bins.

I hate this. People pick up their dog poo on our farm drive. Go to the effort of putting it in a bag. Then either leave it swinging from a tree or in the grass - lovely when our lawn mower goes over the latter

On the back of this thread I downloaded the clean streets app and did my first report today. It was quick and easy...I can see me spamming the council now with all the mess!

Well done! I did three more yesterday, and two today.
The reports from when I started this thread have yet to be picked up though. App says up to seven working days to clear it. Not really acceptable.

I’m also sick of cat shit in our garden too. The thing with people not picking up after dogs, is that it’s seen by the countless people who walk past it.
Cat shit in a garden is only seen by the people who live there.

Horse poo is absolutely not to be compared with * *an abundance of dog shit.
As someone else said, dog's diets are meat based. They also contain toxins and microscopic parasites which blinded a child where I used to live because it was left in a playground and the poor little picked it up.
As unpleasant as faecal matter is, horse poo is grass based and goes back into the earth with no damage to the environment and biodegrades very easily- if they spread it on fields and gardens it can't be terrible for the human body.

I am a dog owner and I agree with this. All dogs should have DNA on record at the expense of the owner. I don’t know why we don’t do this. Create a load of jobs and solve a fucking disgusting problem. I’d support a £1000 fine for every time your dog’s shit is found. Would fund the scheme. If it’s found 5 times, your dog gets rehomed or you pay £20,000 to keep it. Massive fines to stop bastards spoiling our entire country.

Totally agree. I have messaged my MP now to put in a formal request for her to present this to the government. There was more shit every single day on this small path to the school. It is abhorrent to me that people do it at all, but it's worse that they do it right by the school, knowing hundreds of kids will be running along to school and treading in it. One indeed did.

I know this thread is a few days old but a few thoughts on this:
Designated dog parks so dogs aren't pooing in parks with loads of kids playing.
Very regular street cleaning by council. Not just the dog poo but litter also.
Some kind of public campaign to raise awareness/create a social stigma around this behaviour. A bit like the drink driving canpaigns of old. It needs to be so that in 10 or 20 years from now people will say to each other I can't believe we used to do that/think that was ok.

I’m not a dog owner. I’ve definitely seen dog mess on the streets at a level I hadn’t noticed since my own childhood when it was very common and we were all somehow used to it. Why is it happening? How can anyone think it’s ok? Do you think dog owners only pick up when there are others around to see them do it? So late at night they are more inclined to leave it as no witnesses?

Try being a gardener. Shit everywhere. If I chose to only keep customers without dogs, I'd be out of work🙄. Definitely ramped up since 2020.