Chapter 44

Sidetrack (viii) - Who let the dogs out?

Is it just me or is our country going to the dogs - literally?

First a few facts.

In 2019 the dog population was 9.9 million and 25% of UK households owned at least one.

Looking back, with the help of the PDSA, it’s an eye-opener:

1970  5m dogs and 56m people.  That was a 9% ratio or 7% of a combined human and dog population.

2000   6m dogs and 59m people

2010   8m dogs and 63m people

2019 10m dogs and 66m people.  That’s now a 15% ratio or 13% of the combined population

2020 Update - the latest figure is now 10.5m and 27% of UK households own at least one.

You can do the maths yourself but in simple terms the dog population has more than doubled in 50 years and gone up an amazing 25% in the last decade.

If I project the last decade’s rate of growth into the future then, by 2059 when my Time Machine arrives for my 100th birthday party, we could be seeing the following proportions:  97 million dogs and 82 million people so that by then our canine friends will be in a comfortable majority representing over 50% of the combined population and every household will own one.

The other surprising political development I discover upon arrival at this future date is that the  growing campaign for dog emancipation that started early in the 2020’s had, after a long struggle, seen dogs finally obtain the vote in 2039, only 120 years after women achieved the same milestone.  Their voting power could be huge and, if they vote as one, they could easily influence the outcome of any general election.  Not bad for a population of scroungers, very few of whom have done a days’ work in their lives or indeed paid any tax.

Domestic hounds however are not known for their co-operation with each other and rarely enjoy being told what to do by their masters, political or otherwise.  This had resulted in a large number of disobedient mutts running away to form their own breakaway political parties.  Within a few years, and after a lot of in-fighting, these parties had coalesced into two: the Pedigrees and the Mongrels.

Thank goodness that cats don’t give a stuff what anyone thinks (FYI there’s a stable cat population of around 11 million although early indications are that there’s been an increase during the Covid lockdown).

So why is it that such a large number of people enjoy having a dog as part of the family or as a trusty companion?  Alternatively what is it that causes me to completely reject the idea?

Let’s start with me.

I will go the record now and say I do not hate dogs, I’m not scared of the vast majority of the dogs I encounter, and 'some of my best friends are dog-owners.’  I do get a bit edgy if we’re confronted by a fierce looking canine when a footpath passes through a farmyard, and these days I’ll always give a dog a wide berth when riding my bike.  On the other hand I’ve cycled several thousand kilometres in India, Cambodia and Vietnam and passed hundreds of scraggy looking mongrels scavenging by the roadside and never really felt threatened.

So is there something in my background that is stopping me from signing up to the pro-dog branch of society?   Would a psychiatrist prise some root causes out of my sub-conscious?

Maybe there are some character-forming experiences deep in there…

The Time Machine has hurtled back to 1963 and set me down in the garden of Marjorie Parkin our next door neighbour.  An ‘elderly’ single lady in her forties she owned Rex, a big long-haired Alsatian.  I’m assuming that Mum had popped round for a cup of tea and a chat and I was allowed to wander off in the garden amongst the flower beds and vegetable patch.  It’s not clear what caused it; whether I’d poked Rex or he’d not liked the smell of me, but seconds later I was screaming and had blood dripping from my calf where he’d savaged (nipped?) me.

It’s one of my earliest memories and if I look closely I can still see the two little scars where he sank his teeth.  I don’t recall us falling out with Marjorie at all but I was never Rex’s biggest fan after that.  Let’s be fair - an Alsatian is pretty big when matched up against a four year-old.

A short hop forward in time and our family is enjoying a day trip to Dove Dale, a beautiful valley in the southern Peak District only an hour so from Nottingham.  With three small children the excursion would be limited to a walk alongside the river, a climb of the adjacent peak ‘Thorpe Cloud’ followed by a picnic and an ice cream from Mr Whippy in the car park before heading home.  One of the attractions of this little walk was the opportunity to cross the river by the stepping stones, an iconic feature of this particular beauty spot.  Problem was that on this particular day I encountered a dog coming the other way and we faced each other mid stream rather like Robin Hood’s original encounter with Little John.  It wasn’t much of a stand-off as I was brushed aside and ended up being tipped into the river.  The large water bottle I was carrying floated off back downstream and I made my shocked, soaked and humiliated way back to the bank.  I can’t remember but I suspect I was bawling my eyes out rather than hurling a five year old’s worst insults at the smug looking victor.  I guess I dried out and an ice-lolly did the trick but it’s there - the experience imprinted and always ready to send an “alert -remember” message if I encounter a beast coming the other way.

Rolling slowly forwards through the years of growing up its hard to find many other dog encounters.   We never owned one, our relatives didn’t and neither did any of the family friends.  The vast majority of my mates lived in canine-free houses, although Paul Farmer’s mum had this daft-looking white poodle, and so none of us were ever called upon to ‘take the dog for a walk’.

In our street the MacDougall’s, who lived opposite, owned the world’s fastest golden spaniel whose powers of acceleration increased in direct correlation to the volume of the ‘Hector! Get back here!’ shouts aimed at him when he regularly escaped the confines of their garden.  In contrast next door lived Bimbo, a sad-looking plodder of a spaniel who never broke the rules and just ambled up and down Balmoral Drive on his daily walk.

Maybe it’s hardly surprising that my inter-dog skills are rather limited when my closest encounters  from my school days until my thirties was not with the dogs themselves but with what they leave behind for unobservant kids and adults to step in.  Over the years the penalty fine for allowing your dog to ‘foul’ the pavement has substantially increased.  In 1970 a  ‘maximum £5’  was proclaimed on a small metal plate welded to each lamp-post in Balmoral Drive.  Fifty years later South Gloucestershire is supposedly using their powers under Section 59 of the Anti-Social Behaviour Crime and Policing Act 2014.

These powers allow the Council to:

•    Require anyone in control of a dog to demonstrate that they have the means to clear up after their dog(s). ……Dog walkers will be expected to demonstrate that they have bags or other means of clearing up, even if the dog hasn’t defecated at that time. If they cannot they may be issued with a fixed penalty notice of £100 or prosecuted and fined £1,000.

•    This applies on all open-air land with public access including commons, woodland, farmland or heathland.

Interestingly £5 in 1970 is the equivalent of only £77 today so the minimum fine has actually increased.  I wonder how many fines have actually been imposed?

Fast forward to 2014 when an encounter with a young black Labrador in the grounds of Ashton Court resulted in my bike crash and subsequent extended successful recovery.  The Acetabulum crash chapter explores this in much more detail but I don’t believe that my general view, opinions and possible prejudices were changed much by that event - I suspect they had already been embedded.  So having looked back in time for possible explanations lets now advance to 2020, and being as up-front as I can be, identify what there is about dogs and the dog phenomena that I don’t like.

To be honest I’d classify these occurrences more as ‘irritants and annoyances’ rather than anything stronger and they are all seem to be linked to my encounters on the paths and trails when out for a run or walk.  Of course I do acknowledge that everyone has a right to access the outdoors and go to the same spots as I do but the following little things do bug me.

- Take a run through the Vassal’s Estate, our local open public space that comprises a beautiful mix of open grassland, woodland paths and a riverside walk.  It’s perfect with plenty of space for everyone; walkers, families, runners, dogs.  I’ve been running there for years and noticed recently how the subtle increase in dog walking has turned some paths into major thoroughfares.  No problem l can just use the minor little trails that cut through the woods or drop down the hillside to the river.  Except they too have now been discovered by the doggie pioneers and where one dog goes it won’t be long till more follow the scent.  So some of my hidden routes are now getting churned up and muddy and I’m now never sure if I’ll meet a charging hound coming the other way.  It doesn’t matter what the time of day - even in the twilight or dark you’ve got to be wary. The recent trend towards flashing collars does allow you to spot the pets on the loose from hundreds of metres away.  At times it can be like a light show or an airport at night.

• 'It’s okay he’s only playing!' is the usual shouted remark an owner will make when their pet has given chase as I jog along.  Sometimes I’ll stop, hoping it will lose interest, but invariably it will ‘playfully’ leap up and deposit a couple of muddy paw prints on the clean pair of Ron Hills I’d only put on that morning.  What can you do?  It’s probably only barking for fun but there are owners who don’t seem to appreciate that some of us don’t enjoy having a playful dog snapping at our heels.

-  We’ve all seen them; the little black plastic bags hanging from trees by the side of the paths.  Now I’m the first to acknowledge that people are generally much more prepared to clean up their dog’s mess than they were in the past; it’s a very positive step but far from being universal.  I can almost guarantee that owners (or walkers) who are exercising three or more dogs are inevitably going to miss spotting everything.  I’ve often noticed that whilst in conversation with a friend, chatting on a mobile, or dealing with another dog’s mess, they’ll miss Rover’s latest deposit that he’s left behind whilst they were distracted.  And there’s no real excuse for leaving a bag swinging from a branch.

That’s about it.  I can’t really grumble about dogs in pubs as I suppose they’re no worse than children and we often took our boys out to eat with us.  I can’t really raise my eyebrows about the costs of owning dogs as we probably spend a similar amount on our fleet of bikes.  A yappy dog barking away on a campsite isn’t exactly a big deal…

So looking at the issue with a different hat on  …

‘In our survey we asked 100 owners across the country to give us their Top Ten reasons why they could never be without a do.’’

(Actually we asked Bridget and Mike one evening when sitting in their caravan but I think they’ve probably identified the key benefits).

I’m prepared to accept these as a given and acknowledge that there’s plenty of supporting evidence out there.

The dog owners viewpoint?

Clearly owning a dog provides companionship, particularly for those living alone, and they are undoubtedly a loving and loyal pet who generally seem completely devoted to their owners.  I’ve got to agree that they also have personalities - daft, dopey, warm, funny, miserable, and sneaky.  It’s a complete spectrum but you can’t argue that sometimes you’ve just got to laugh at their antics.

Apparently they’re also able to sense emotions and can be willing, if silent, partners in long, boring conversations.  Owners would probably admit too that the dog dozing on the carpet can always be relied upon to accept the blame for any unpleasant smells that drift across a room.

In a nation increasingly welded to our sofas there’s evidently a big benefit to be obtained from the need for compulsory ‘walkies.’  Lots of owners are dragged out on a daily basis and therefore reap the spin-off benefits of a leg stretch, the chance for a conversation with a fellow dog-walker, and a big dose of fresh air.

In a wider context the fact that some dogs are smart enables us as a society to take advantage of some of their skills.  Just think ‘One Man and his Dog’ or the role of guide dogs, police, sniffer or rescue dogs.  There’s also the odd instance where we’d never have found that Ancient Roman treasure trove if some mutt hadn’t been rooting about where it shouldn’t have been.

The scientific evidence is also there somewhere that makes the case for a natural symbiotic relationship that has grown up over thousands of years between our two species.  It’s not just a recent trend as humans all over the world have always owned dogs, either as working animals or as pets and, apart from the odd exception (wolves, dingoes), dogs have always wanted to be with humans.

My conclusion therefore is that there must be something in our DNA that determines whether you’re a dog lover or not.  What is also evident is that a large proportion of the human race must possess this ‘dog-loving’ gene, passed down through our ancestors from the beginning of time.

It skipped a generation or two with my grandparents and parents but my sister and brother both have it: Jackie and Nick currently have three free-roving characters, led by Teddy the Jack Russell, patrolling their small-holding as though it was their own; the latest in a line of 11 that stretch back to her first home in 1985, and Rick and Carla have lived first with Zoe, then Ruby, their Airedales for well over a decade.

As a final comment on the matter, I’m happy to accept what I’ve known since childhood when I was never a big Lassie fan, always being more drawn to The Deputy, Spit or Muttley.  It’s abundantly clear to me that I’ve missed out genetically on this one.

Fortunately it would appear Sue has too.   

Image removed: Deputy Dawg (Hanna-Barbera)  Muttley (Terrytoons)

Image removed: Clean Up sign Image removed: Black Labrador