A dog in the snow

Clean Up After Your Pets

Clean Up After Your Pets


This is something that should not have to be brought up, but unfortunately that often isn’t the case. Many times I take my dog outside to do his business and I run into a mound of dog crap on the sidewalk that someone decided would be too difficult to pick up. There is absolutely no excuse for this type of behaviour and if you can’t pick up after your pet, you shouldn’t have a pet.

A dog in the snow
Blue Eyed dog with snow coming off its back.

Many of these people think if they aren’t seen by anyone when the offence takes place, they are not going to be caught. On our property we have video cameras and I have used them to find the offenders and then let them know they have been caught on video and that they need to clean up the mess left by their pet. I just don’t see the big problem with cleaning up after your pet. No one likes to get dog crap on their shoes, so it’s just a matter of having some respect for others when it comes to bending over and cleaning the dog crap up.

It’s Now The Law

In most towns and cities now, it’s the law to clean up after your pets. I’ve seen some property managers have also set bylaws regarding caring and cleaning up after pets with some fairly expensive fines for those who choose not to abide by the rules. As I live in the City of Ottawa, I have to follow the bylaws set for this community. Recently, we’ve had some new neighbours move in behind us and they have a couple of Pit-bulls. We’ve seen them let their dogs outside and tied to a long leash which gives the dogs enough room to enter the property of our coop and do their business. They then do not clean up after their dogs and have actually placed the blame on my dog when someone called Ottawa Bylaw to report them. At the time, my Beagle pup was 5 months old weighed less than 20 pounds. We have always picked up after our dog and the mounds that were left for Ottawa Bylaw to see made it quite clear they did not come from our Beagle pup. I don’t know who called the city to complain about the issue, but there was video to dispute their claims.

I’m not sure why someone would lay blame for something they clearly were responsible for on someone else, but in this case it didn’t work out in their favour. The same goes for those who walk their dogs along the bike and walking paths within the city. There are signs which clearly indicate that one must not walk their dogs without a leash and that you must pick up after your dog. The City even puts trash containers along the walkways to help prevent littering. For dogs, they take the matter even further and provide special steel bins to contain the odour of the waste bags that people may deposit. And still, there are people who refuse to clean up after their dogs even when other people have clearly seen the offence when it took place.

If you have a dog and take it for walks outside, you have a responsibility to clean up after it. This not only makes for cleaner view, it also helps prevent the spread of disease. Disposal bags can be purchased at any pet store as well as every dollar store I’ve ever been in. I purchase mine from Amazon and have a subscription that has them delivered in bulk every six months. A new dispenser is even included with each delivery of the waste bags.

So if you are a pet owner, be responsible and clean up when they take a dump. Disposal bags aren’t expensive and you can even get a subscription from services such as Amazon so you will always have a supply on hand. No one I know likes stepping into dog crap and if everyone cleaned up after their pets, the possibility of that happening would be eliminated.

Cheers,

GP Joa

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