No more foul play! Plan to use DNA tests to trace messy dogs

YOU could call it a crime most foul – and one senator is hoping her plan will see perpetrators put on a tighter leash.

Fianna Fáil’s Catherine Ardagh is proposing a new Bill that would allow dog excrement to be DNA tested to trace pet owners that don’t clean up after their careless canine.

The London borough of Barking and Dagenham has already rolled out a pilot scheme DNA testing dog faeces and it says the amount of droppings has halved since the initiative was introduced.

Senator Ardagh, speaking to the Irish Daily Mail, said: ‘When I was asked how we could catch people who were not cleaning up after their dog, I said we could DNA test the dog poop and trace it back to the owner. I was joking initially but then when I looked it up I found that Barking was already doing something similar.

‘They collected a database of dogs in the area in the hope so that if an owner doesn’t clean up after their dog they can trace it back to them.’

However, she added: ‘It is costly to carry out the DNA testing – around €30 to €40 – so it would be a very expensive initiative and of course there are more important things we need to be spending money on. But in the future when technology catches up it is something that would allow us to trace owners who don’t clean up their dog’s poop.’

Senator Ardagh has put forward the Litter Pollution Amendment Bill proposing stronger rules for dog fouling in public places and noise pollution from barking.

The issue was discussed again this week by the Oireachtas Petitions Committee. There are companies who have already offered a dog doo-doo DNA testing service – but one firm, Easy DNA, has pooh-poohed the idea, saying it was not a hit with customers.

A spokesman for Easy DNA told the Mail: ‘No one ever ordered a DNA test of dog poop to trace their owner in the two or three years that we were offering the service so we have discontinued it. You’d have to have a database of every dog in the country’s DNA. It is just not feasible at the moment. We had a few enquires mostly from councils but we never sold one.’

Barking and Dagenham Council previously said the amount of dog mess in three parks has dropped by 50% since it started the pilot test scheme in January. If a sample matches a dog on the database the owner will be traced and fined £150 (€170).