Poop Ordinance....I Have Been Warned

Cathy, I agree with you.  I walk 2-3 large dogs at a time, on 3-4 foot leashes that still have enough slack so they are not in a close heel or pulling at me, and I keep them on the sidewalk.  Part of when I train the loose leash walk is that it happens on the sidewalk.  If the dogs want to wander around and sniff grass, we go to a park for that. 

cakana

We make our dogs poop and/or pee before we take them for a walk.

Snap!  During early house training, the reward for peeing/pooping is a tasty treat.  Then, once we can take them out and about we ditch the treat most of the time and just use either praise or a walk.  Believe me, you have never seen dogs pee/poo so danged fast.  I also don't think it's "ok" to let your dog do his business on other people's property, even if you clean it up.

I keep my dogs off people's property for the most part, but if they do go on the grass it's within 2 ft of the curb (no sidewalks here).  I try to potty them before walks and they generally know where I let them go up onto the grass for breaks (edge of wooded vacant lots vs. yards), but poo happens sometimes when you least expect it so I carry at least one bag more than the number of dogs I'm walking.

Kirby is beautiful.  Any relation to the "famout" Kirby"

WOW!!!  I didn't realize I was such a bad dog owner. 

Thanks for all the replies. 

 You are certainly not a bad dog owner. Different people see and do things differently. I personally don't have sidewalks in my town and if I let my pups poop or pee it's by the road. You don't live where I live though so I won't judge. As long as you are responsible. I have no issues..My dogs poop on my lawn...Who am I to be hypocritical.

sterlingfan40

Kirby is beautiful.  Any relation to the "famout" Kirby"

WOW!!!  I didn't realize I was such a bad dog owner. 

Thanks for all the replies. 

On an interesting note however my Aunt just got a pap a week ago that comes from the 'famout' Kirby lines.  She got a 3-5 month female pup that was turning out too small to have any potential to breed/show and plans to us her for agility.

Max is so accustomed to a doggy door that I'm sure he'd think I was nuts if I tried to make him pee/poop at a particular time. Lately I've been walking him more in the neighborhood than in the park since we don't encounter as many squirrels or other dogs, but it certainly isn't hard to keep him off other peoples lawns. We do go by a big vacant field and he often poops at the edge of it, but that's really city property. He poops a lot anyway, so even if he did go at home before we left we'd still use at least a couple of bags.

Joyce

Ours used to poo a lot before we changed the food.... Too much poo says to me some of the food might be undigested, so that would mean either a) too much food, b) a low quality food or c) a digestive tract problem.  I could be way off on that, but that was just my way of thinking.  Mind you, ours are not particularly large.  Anyway, we switched and there is MUCH less poo now, it is drier and easier to scoop.  We rarely EVER use the bags when we go out now... we try to remember to carry them, just in case, but they are usually un-needed.

Tell you what though, I saw a lady scoop after her dog a little while ao and I thought, "how nice to see, so many people don't do that".  Then the woman ties the plastic bag and tosses it on the grass verge.  I was hopping mad!  I quickened my pace to catch up with her and ask WTH did she thnk she was doing?!  But she saw that I'd seen her and saw my expression and hurried away.  I was totally bewildered and furious.  WHY do that?!?!!  It's even worse than not scooping at all!

They poop more when they are eating green tripe then they do eating gullet or Morigins.

Oh Lord.  I can't imagine picking up the poop, bagging it and then tossing the bag back where the dog pooped.  She might as well just leave it alone.  Max eats EP Holistic and for a big dog he really doesn't eat much at all.  I put 1-1/2 cups in his bowl in the a.m.  Sometimes he finishes it over the day and sometimes he doesn't.  If he does, he gets another 1/2 cup at night and again, sometimes he finishes that and sometimes he doesn't. He weighs 60 lbs. and his eating habits are more like grazing on and off.  If we're having a heat wave, it's not unusual for him to ignore his food all day and then eat it all about 9:00 p.m.  He just poops three or four times a day, which seems to be the norm for him.

Joyce

Max is a pig! I give him his 1 1/2 cups in the morning and 1 1/2 at night. He eats it right up, usually he'll poop twice a day, but if we go to the dog park or have dogs over he'll poop maybe 4 times durring the day.

We have cut back on his food, and changed it so that there are less fillers and he dosen't need as much. He's a big dog especially for a golden but he really not that "fat" he's a got a big dead and big feet the rest of him is pretty porportional

huskymom

Crusher's is more like,"Running  Running   Running...sniffing...Run over here, run over there, tackle Onyx, run a bit more, check back in with mom, bit Onyx' head on the flyby, oops pooping, done, run run run..."  We get no notice.

I usually have all three dogs go before walks, just because I do feel bad when they go on someone's lawn.  But I always carry multiple bags with me just in case.

And I'm with what everyone else has said, I don't believe you can be ticketed without proof.  It sounds like there's a "Gladys Kravitz" on your walk somewhere who probably mistook peeing for pooping.

Chuffy

I was totally bewildered and furious.  WHY do that?!?!!  It's even worse than not scooping at all!

I doubt this was the case with the woman you saw, Chuffy, but we have a neighbor who always picks up after her dog.  However, she and her dog walk a VERY long route all over our neighborhood, and her dog typically poops somewhat early in the walk.  So, she ties the bag up tightly, and she places it against the curb in the street to collect on her way back to their house so she doesn't have to carry it for 2-3 miles.  When we first moved here, I'd see these bags while walking our dog and wondered why they were there, then it made total sense when I learned what she was doing.  She has a very large dog, so I don't blame her for not wanting to carry a large piece of unpleasant "luggage" with her for 45 minutes!

Every dog is different with preferences - our dog needed a good walk to "stimulate" elimination, so it was very difficult to get him to go at home first.  However, of the many dogs we "babysit," some MUST go in the grass, others MUST go on concrete, some require 2 seconds in the backyard and they're done, others have to hang out and sniff the air and flowers a while.  I guess it's like people - all habits are different!  All we can do is have baggies in the pocket of every coat we wear, and be diligent about using them, no matter where or when it happens.

tacran

Every dog is different with preferences - our dog needed a good walk to "stimulate" elimination, so it was very difficult to get him to go at home first.  However, of the many dogs we "babysit," some MUST go in the grass, others MUST go on concrete, some require 2 seconds in the backyard and they're done, others have to hang out and sniff the air and flowers a while.  I guess it's like people - all habits are different!  All we can do is have baggies in the pocket of every coat we wear, and be diligent about using them, no matter where or when it happens.

Absolutely. Of my two, Flem has never peed or pooped on a walk. She does it all in the backyard on a pretty regular schedule. Spip on the other hand will pee mark several times and poop at least once on every walk. On the days we do not walk, she only poops twice on schedule (I could almost set my clok by it, lol); on the days we walk she has to leave her signature somewhere along the road even if she has gone before, thwating her own schedule out of whack. They have the same access to the yard and are never walked before being given the opportunity to go there. Just different dogs with different relations to the outside of the property. I only let Spip on the strip between the road and the walkway, never on anybody's front lawn and I bag each and every time.

Sometimes it looks like they're pooping when they're actually peeing, other times, if they are constipated, they try to poop, but nothing comes out. I always wonder if people are watching and think that I didn't pick up after them and that I left a mess behind, like this morning. OR if they have a super runny stool there is no way I can pick it up and that happens sometimes, so I have no choice to leave it. Normally when that happens it's just a tiny bit and trying to pick it up winds up being a huge mess! But I am very diligent about picking up after my girls - I can't stand it when we are walking and come upon a huge pile that someone has obviously left there..... of course, my dogs want to sniff it and I hurry them away as fast as I can. Unfortunately, when you live in an apartment community, there tends to be a high incidence of people who just don't care!