This article is from page 6 of the 2011-02-08 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 6 JPG
LESS than 10 per cent of dogs in Clare are licenced, according to the county’s dog warden. Frankie Coote believes there are 35,000 dogs in the county, only 4,500 of which have licences.
He said that by-laws would have to be introduced in an effort to tackle this. Dog licences cost just € 12.70 each. “You can guarantee that the 4,500 are being well looked after and walked,” he told a meeting of Shannon Town Council last week.
He said that Kilrush and Shannon are blackspots for dogs roaming freely.
While the issue of dangerous dogs has abated in general and the “welfare issue” has improved a lot, there are concerns about the number of dogs not on leads.
He said that 177 dogs were surrendered by their owners in the past four months.
He is proposing to carry out a blitz and over the space of a couple of days in Shannon in an effort to clamp down on wandering dogs and said he believes that less than five per cent of dogs in the town have licences.
Mr Coote told councillors that there had been several dangerous dogs in the Shannon area, but most of those have now been taken out of circulation.
“Most of the dogs I identified are no longer in Shannon or they are no longer on the loose,” he said.
He said he was notified of an incident in the town recently where a pitbull terrier “almost killed another man’s dog who was on a lead”.
However, he said that no complaints were lodged “until the dog half killed a dog and attacked a man”.
He said that Clare County Council is reluctant to prosecute people and said it costs € 2, 500 to bring a case to court. On average, 50 fines, of € 32 each, are dished out every year by the dog warden to those who fail to control their dogs.
“When you do pick up dogs I’d be more than surprised if they [owners] came looking for them in Shannon. Either they are abandoning them or the owners just don’t care,” he said.
“Kilrush and Shannon are two blackspots. I have seen massive improvements in Ennis, but there has been absolutely no improvement with the amount of dogs that are loose in Shannon,” he said.
“I am proposing to do a blitz and pick up dogs. I will not have people going around with bull terriers, rotweillers and alsatians on the loose. It is a problem in Shannon. The law says you can be fined € 1,200 if your dog is not on a lead,” he added.
He said that in one instance dogs were running around a garden where dead rats were lying, which created a huge concern.
Cllr Gerry Flynn (Ind) told the meeting that there are issues in relation to dogs roaming in various parts of the town, including Rossbracken. “People are afraid to walk. I walk there myself and it’s like a greyhound track at times,” he said.