Owner admonished over sheep worrying

Family pet bit lamb and pulled it to ground

The owner of a dog that worried livestock and pulled a lamb to the ground at Kilchoan was admonished at Fort William Sheriff Court this week.

Due to ill health, Helen Margaret Anne Ferguson, of Grianan, Kilchoan, was not in court this week to hear Sheriff Eilidh MacDonald’s verdict, but her daughter was.

Ferguson, 54, had pleaded guilty at a previous court appearance to being the owner of the dog in question, a Labradoodle named Tinkerbell, which had worried sheep in a field at Ben Hiant, Kilchoan, on September 9 last year.

The court heard that the dog had bit a lamb and pulled it to the ground.

Procurator Fiscal David Morton told the court the offence took place around 1pm on a Saturday afternoon when neighbours of Mrs Ferguson became aware of sheep running from the shore to a field in an area of common grazing.

‘It seems a gate had been left open and witnesses saw, in the corner of the field, that there was a lamb on the ground being bitten by a dog, which belonged to Mrs Ferguson,’ he said.

One witness was driving past and honked his car horn in an effort to distract the dog and stop the attack, while other local people were able to chase the dog away.

Some of those involved knew it was Mrs Ferguson’s dog and it was subsequently reported to the police. The farmer of the sheep involved had been offered compensation but the lamb had survived and the matter was not taken any further by the parties involved and seemed to have been quickly resolved.

However, defence agent Hamish Melrose, who told the court the incident had also been captured on video, said the first his client knew there was a problem was when police officers came to her home about two weeks later.

‘This dog is a family pet and was two years old at the time. Since the incident there has been no recurrence of this kind of behaviour by the dog,’ said Mr Melrose.

‘It happened on an adjacent croft and the dog had got through a gate which had been left open. Since then measures have been taken to ensure the dog cannot get out so easily.’

Mr Melrose said the family had hired a dog trainer from Carlisle for three days of specialist behaviour training and since then the animal had shown no signs of repeating the offending behaviour.

‘Hopefully, this was very much a one-off incident,’ added Mr Melrose.

Mr Morton told the sheriff he had no information that any injuries had been suffered by the sheep or that veterinary treatment had been required and in those circumstances, Ferguson was admonished by the sheriff.