The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Community => Coffee Lounge => Topic started by: NorthEssexsmallholding on May 28, 2011, 10:45:05 pm
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Some people may think this is trivial but its not nice to find dog sh*t on your veg plot.
I've just taken on renting some land and I always had some reservations about the fact theres a public footpath that runs through the field, although it is not that well used. In the 3 months I've been there I have not had a problem or not noticed one, but today I went there and saw that there were several lots of dog muck right on my veg plot. Its definitely dogs, I know the difference between fox and dogs.
Now I understand that theres a public footpath and people walk their dogs but someone has obviously let their dog do this and its clearly private land and they seem to think its acceptable. It also is likely to be someone local to the land as its pretty much in the middle of nowhere.
This makes me think it could be one of the neighbours who has taken a dislike to what I'm doing, as the field has just been cropped with cereal crops for many years, and maybe they have always just let their dogs s**t anywhere.
I just wondered is this an offence, after all its on private land, and what can I do to try to prevent this happening on a regular basis.
I was thinking of getting a sign, but what should my sign read?. At this stage I dont want to come accross as aggresive, just to make my point and try to stop it from happening.
Had I been there to see this happening I would have been furious, if this happens again and I do find the culprit then I wonder how they would like me taking my dog to do his business on their lawn.
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You may find the veg go and the poo stays, unless you have criminal connections that frighten locals, not much can be done. THe people who would pick up thier poo need no signs, those that don't will not pay attention to any signs!!!!!
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I do feel for you though and I would want payback too!!!
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I think you will find that many people with dogs think that letting their dogs crap anywhere in the countryside is OK, whereas if they walked along a town or city street they'd pick up. We have the same problem in our lane. The grass verge at one side is mine, and at first my son strimmed it regularly, but he was having to shower every time afterwards and it wasn't pleasant job so I told him to leave it and tried my ride on mower instead. It got clooged up so I called the Council Animal welfare officer. Eric said it was rough ground and if I kept it tidy people wouldn't let their dogs use it, and as far as he was concerned it wasn't a public lane so he couldn't help. So I tried keeping it cut over a period of three weeks and guess what - nothing changed. So now it is a wilderness of weeds, pretty flowers, long grasses and the poop is hidden from view. To answer your question it is not an offence except if the Council want it to be!
I suggest you put up nice signs asking Joe Public to very kindly keep theri dogs off your vegetabels and leave some poo bags nearby - they are free from the Council! I doubt if it will have any effect so the only other alternative is to fence in your vegetables.
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just read that its not an offence on agricultural land which seems bizarre on land for used for growing food for human consumption. Suppose the only way is to fence the whole plot off, or see whos dog it is and ask them to take their dog down the other end of the field. They wont like it when I fill a weeks worth of it and return it to them on their lawn.
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I have been told by our local footpath man, that a public path over a field is covered by the same rules as a path through a town or whatever, so technically the owner should obey the rules of picking the poo up in your field. As to your veg plot, its wrong for them to allow the dog to use that as a toilet. They should have the dog "under close control" on the path. I assume your plot is not fenced off - is there no way you could do this. perhaps put an electic strand round it?
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I understood that it was an offence to leave dog sh#t lying, even in the countryside. You would need to catch the culprit red..er..handed before you could do anything about it. Although it would be wonderful to return it all to them, especially with the burning paper bag on the doorstep trick ;D, you would end up being the one prosecuted. Really your best bet is to fence off your veg plot - you need to do it anyway to keep the rabbits and human tealeaves off once your crops appear. The kind of person who lets their dog cr#p on someone's vegetables is not likely to be someone who regularly worms their pet, so you need to safeguard your food against parasites.
I totally understand why you must be hopping mad about it :wave:
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join thr local countryside watch and get a couple of their signs and add a well presented one of your own underneath them
Warning
Countryside Watch area
your message ...
You may be on camera
Take your dog 's dung home with you !
It is an offence to leave your dog's mess in a public area .
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hi
we have a bridleway going though our land and people think they have rights to do what they want....... a public footpath is only a right of way to pass from A to B ...... not a right to do what they want....... ::)
which they seem to think. we had a problem with lots of poo..... again from locals as the land was left uncared for before we came. we tidied it up and then spoke to the bridleways/footpath dept at the council (it will be the county council not the local one) they supplied free signs etc to put up. we have also put signs asking to keep dogs on leads, after 3 dogs mawled our cat to death last year :'( .... although they said we can only say "under control"
making it clear where the footpath is may help.... some farmers spay weed killer on the path so it is yellow and clearly visible
good luck
Mx
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We have a dive down to the road, beech hedging and grass verges (cut) - and we get piles of dog poo. It's really annoying - once we put up a gate, we'll put up signs.
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I don't suppose you could turn a nuisance into a benefit ....?
http://www.accidentalsmallholder.net/forum/index.php?topic=14999.0 (http://www.accidentalsmallholder.net/forum/index.php?topic=14999.0)
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Dogs respond very well to electric fencing. You can keep the bunnies out with it also ;D
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I have public footpaths across my land and TBH I hate them now as people just think they can let the dogs run wild or feed the livestock. they have left gates open I have had dog bites on sheeps faces, a bucket of apples poured into the horses field. All of the paths on my land are clearly marked with electric fencing but people turn this off so they can get into the field. The dog poo is littered all over the fields which means I have to go round and pick it up regularly and yes there are signs on the gates telling people it is not acceptable
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How awful! I am so thankful we do not have paths. Its a shame that these thoughless people cause you all so much extra work. Seems to me they are more concerned with what they think are their rights rather than their responsibilities. The very sad thing is that what tehy will teach their children to do too >:(
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We have more environmentally responsible people around here. What they do is pick up the poo in a bag and then leave the bag. Indeed some hang the bag in the hedge so you can get a better view of the thing.
People are weird
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My father in law did not like the dog mess in his garden, so he used to drive his dog over to the local rough ground, and let the dog run into and poo on the playing fields adjacent. Nothing I said could ever make him understand or clear it up.
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Dog poo bags left lying around are intensely interesting to cattle. And probably won't but can kill them. (To be honest I am surprised that any calves ever reach maturity! They'll try to eat absolutely everything they find.)
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We have more environmentally responsible people around here. What they do is pick up the poo in a bag and then leave the bag. Indeed some hang the bag in the hedge so you can get a better view of the thing.
People are weird
;D ;D Sorry - can't help but laugh at that :D I wonder what goes through their minds.
Maybe you could ask the council for a dog poo bin for them to put their poop bags in.
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Dog poo bags left lying around are intensely interesting to cattle. And probably won't but can kill them. (To be honest I am surprised that any calves ever reach maturity! They'll try to eat absolutely everything they find.)
The bags don't even have to be full of dog poo ;). Round here we suffer from white van man who tosses his food wrappers and fag packets into our sheep fields, so we have to pick up every day. To be fair, they also toss their Daily Records in, so the tups can check the football results.
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Well you will have happy tups knowing the final scores ;D :sheep:
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We do indeed have a bright red poo bin. But do you seriously expect me to carry POO all the way over to the bin. Really, you should know better. We live next to a common, and as we all know, common land exists in the urban fringe as a handy place to empty the dog.
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I've seen the poop bags hung from hedges or gate posts as well, not on my land but down at the local woods, its actually worse to do that, at least dog muck will decompose over time but a bag full will not and looks even more unsightly and it a risk to animals and livestock.
Thanks for everyones replies on here, glad I'm not the only one to suffer this misfortune. I will fence the whole plot when I can afford to and long term I may do the whole field and plant hedgerows along either side of the path to stop them from straying onto the land.
Will look into getting some signs as well.
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Our council has started issuing bio degradable poo bogs because of that ridiculous habit. ::)
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Berberis will make a good sharp reminder to keep out ;D ;D
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We do indeed have a bright red poo bin. But do you seriously expect me to carry POO all the way over to the bin. Really, you should know better. We live next to a common, and as we all know, common land exists in the urban fringe as a handy place to empty the dog.
But of course ;D And what would be the point of driving all that way only to take all that poo home again, or even put it in your bin ??? And if someone sees me carrying a bag of poo they might laugh at me :'(
We used to have wolfhounds and their poos are enormous and not easy to scoop - horrible job (pun not intended but I'll leave it ;D) but better than a child standing in it. At least though these days the city streets are not smeared with doggydoos - when I was a child it was always a dance along the pavements avoiding them. Maybe, hopefully, people will eventually get the message in the country too :dog:
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As we have a Newfoundland we can't manage with ickle tiny doggy doo bags, we have to use the supermarket carrier bags! We get loads of mess down our lane, there are only 2 houses down the lane so because it is quiet people like to come and walk their dogs - and because there are only 2 houses there is obviously no need at all to pick up the mess ::) We take turns picking up crap with the bloke 1/2 mile down the road as our son and his grandchildren all play out there.
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Berberis will make a good sharp reminder to keep out ;D ;D
I did wonder about planting the verge with something like berberis and gorse but it's about 100 yds and I'd need a lot of plants, plus it's been rough for years so would be difficult to dig. Don't think I can afford it.
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this thread is funny could it not be human crap in the veg plot it reminds me of a site in leith that i was at once this lady (posh accent) comes over to me and asks what are you doing(test holes dug all over the nice green grass area) there is going to be a development here AND WHERE AM I GOING TO EXERCISE MY DOG AFTER THIS IS BUILT ON
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I think it's rosa rugosa which is really prickly which councils sometimes plant. We planted a stretch of hedge with that in an effort to stop the cows from next door eating it - didn't work as they love it but it grows at least 8' high and becomes impenetrable. It's very cheap bareroot from Buckingham Nurseries and also suckers and spreads so you could start off with a short stretch and transplant gradually, or start thinly and let it bush out. It also has the advantage that the flowers are pretty and then it has hips we could all be proud of ;D You can trim the sides with a hedge trimmer to help keep flowers from the ground to the top - dogs and humans absolutely can't get through it, although chooks love it. It's also tough enough that you don't have to prepare the ground carefully - just make a spade slit and plant. It soon shades out the grass.
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Berberis will make a good sharp reminder to keep out ;D ;D
I did wonder about planting the verge with something like berberis and gorse but it's about 100 yds and I'd need a lot of plants, plus it's been rough for years so would be difficult to dig. Don't think I can afford it.
Bide your time buy three or six "Jennifer " berberris they are the spikes from hell and grow them for cuttings , , tear them off a less than 2 yr old plant , use a hormone compound and grow your own clones for a couple of years , set the growing bed over some well cultivated ground that has plenty of rotted muck in it and cover the bed in black poly sheet that has the edges weighted /dug into the ground this serves not only weed control but keeps thing moist and channels rain to each plant . at each cutting site make a small heel dent in the grond and put a small slit in , bung the cutting in ..set them out when 20 inches high in early spring along a Round up sprayed rotavated bed just outside the foot path bounbdaries and run a wire along the line on waist high posts .
Set them in slightlya staggered formation one every 2 feet .and use a general fertilizer to bring them on .
I did this to thousands of cuttings from all sorts of plants... Laurel works well for a solid wall of impenetratable growth ( can grow to 30 ish feet ) to the average punter when propagated properly.
It took me four years to make a 200 mtr long wall of it five feet high laurel .. but is not so good in stock places . My mate Don actually wove the young four foot plants like a laid staked hedge without the cutting of the wood to make a totally impenetrable wall of it on his small holding .
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Might try the rosa rugosa - there is no way on this earth I could cultivate the strip - it's blooming saturated with weeds of all sorts and brick hard. I MIGHT just get a spade in bits of it.
Thanks for the :wave: ideas.
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We've found human shite in hedges - but I cant say I've never been caught short of a bog and havnt done it myself although its annoying to say the least.
As for my yard to be honest I'm never sure what s**t I'm treading in but there is always s**t of somekind. Thanks god for slate floors inside the house!!
If dogs were shitting on my veg patch I'd be well pissed off - infact it would put me off eating anything straight from the garden.
I'd put a chicken wire fence up round my patch, its a bit of work but sure it will protect them from lots of animals shitting there.
Baz
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Laurel works well for a solid wall of impenetratable growth ( can grow to 30 ish feet ) to the average punter when propagated properly.
It took me four years to make a 200 mtr long wall of it five feet high laurel .. but is not so good in stock places .
Errr... laurel is certainly poisonous to horses, I have always assumed to all stock?
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If only you lived closer!
I have spent the last 3 years trying to control and dig out the rosa rugosa my MIL planted in a large bed in my garden. I am now trying to remove it all, and as I take it out replace with a normal rose. Rosa Rugosa is virile - I clear the bed regularly and still get suckers everywhere. If you wanted some, the amount I have dug out in 3 years could have planted most of your path!
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we too had a problem with this as 2 footpaths cross our land. we put up a dog poo bin and this seems to have done the trick but it does mean we have to empty it every 2 weeks and take it to the tip which is not my favourite chore !
:sheep: