Dog waste issue generates pooh- pooh responses
The reality of urban dog waste and what to do with it got plenty of response from readers. Some dog owners took it as an unfair attack on dog culture, as though calling for a public conversation about this growing problem represents a hidden agenda for the banning of dogs.
Not so. I like dogs. I grew up with dogs. Much of my extended family has dogs. Some of my best friends have dogs. I haven’t shunned any of them because they have dogs and I enjoy their dogs when I go to visit them. I believe there’s a valuable social benefit to dog ownership.
None of this should compromise the issue of how municipal authorities grapple with the estimated 61,000 tonnes of dog excrement deposited across the Metro Region every year.
Some correspondents were outraged that attention was drawn to the public health issue of dog feces in parks, on school and picnic grounds, on sandy beaches and washing into waterways from sidewalks, gutters and storm drains.
This was perceived as sensationalizing a non- problem.
Sorry, but public health authorities think uncollected dog waste is a sanitation problem. Agencies include the U. S. Environmental Protection Agency, the Public Health Agency of Canada, the Canadian Public Health Association, and a host of municipalities across the country, most of which now have sanitation bylaws governing pet waste, its management and its disposal. Frankly, it’s hard to understand how anyone could suggest that depositing tens of thousands of tonnes of untreated raw sewage across the urban landscape each year could be anything but a public health issue.
Heck, if a septic tank leaks, you must dig it up and fix it. Who argues with that?
Some dog owners chose the reductio ad absurdum rhetoric: There hasn’t been a case of toxocariasis reported in B. C., therefore roundworms in dog feces are not a problem. But research shows parasites are frequently present in dog feces. And there’s a problem with cross infection between dogs and urban wildlife — dogs eating raccoon feces, for example, and acquiring the parasites.
Since 1985, only two human cases of human rabies have been diagnosed, but rabies is a public health concern. Few cases of hantavirus, a frequently fatal disease associated with rodent droppings, are reported but it’s a public health concern. There have been no cases of the human variant of mad cow disease in B. C., known to have derived from cattle, but a case in the cattle herd is cause for draconian public health action.
Mind you, pet owners are to be forgiven if they are confused. So are municipal authorities.
Richmond bans all forms of excrement from garbage in one bylaw but permits Kitty Litter and disposable diapers in another. It also bans any matter that may be germ- infested and bans any waste that might be pathogenic. All these contradictory rules would apply to the same parcel of dog waste.
Vancouver prohibits all forms of excrement from garbage containers. It recommends flushing feces down the toilet or purchasing a special purpose composter for later use in the garden. However, the city acknowledges that some excrement goes into the garbage and prefers that to leaving it.
The regional government advises composting but warns that it should not be used on the household garden because of concerns about bacteria like E. coli and other pathogens.
Metro suggests, in apparent order of preference, composting in a specialty bin, flushing, burying in the back yard, setting up a worm farm, or hiring one of the private pet waste contractors to make the problem disappear.
What’s clear from this is that we do need that public conversation. Not so that we can have another round of blame- casting, finger- pointing, redherrings and head- in- the- sand denial about the issues of pet waste.
With dog ownership growing and estimates that excrement could reach more than a million tonnes over the next 20 years, we obviously need a comprehensive and consistent region- wide policy.
The only way we are going to get one is by talking frankly about reality rather indulging ourselves in selfindulgent denial or self- righteous condemnation.