Getting rid of Doggy Doo is a real problem for pet owners and for our profession. Doggy Waste makes up a significant source of the waste stream to landfill. One American website stated 4%.
Going to landfill is fraught will all sorts of issues including leachates from the plastics (including the so called biodegradeable ones) and the fact that the dog faeces in the bags is not being broken down so the level of contamination will potentially increase over time. In addition the methane and other greenhouse gas release from landfills. At landfills, they try to prevent breakdown too as much as possible so there is also the situation that a waste product that is able to be broken down is being sent into a linear system. Our goal needs to be zero waste to landfill, because landfill is an end point in a linear system and in order to be sustainable everything needs to be cyclic.
Commercial composting (compost waste collected a kerbside) doesn't work because the system is too fast and they sell the compost which could end up on vegetable gardens and they don't want to risk (however small) people getting sick from doggy doo contaminants. This is why doggy doo is specifically excluded from these bins.
It is my opinion that individual pet owners and members of the animal industry need to change the way they/we deal with doggy doo and encourage the councils providing doggy doo bins to do the same.
Buried doggy doo in your garden will eventually be broken down by soil microbes but using the accelerated bokashi system described in the YouTube videos below speeds up the process. This is a Canadian based system and I am investigating what is available here that is similar.
There are many other links on YouTube that describe ways to compost doggy doo. Remember to use your skills to pick the professional videos vs those that aren't and need to be verified by another source. Some other videos suggest using septic tank bacterial systems for accelerating breakdown.
This series of videos on YouTube is using a bokashi system based on the system from this website: http://www.bokashicycle.com/petcycle.html:
Would it be economic for council to collect all faeces at kerbside (a doggy doo bin) look after it for its citizens or should the citizens take responsibility. What about at dog parks - should the council provide a composting system at the gate and also encourage the used of scoops or paper to pick up waste not plastic. Who educates the citizens? Our profession could play a big part here. We are good at explaining about desexing, vaccinating etc but what about community service stuff like responsible doogy doo disposal.
I am really interested in some discussion on this. What are you doing? Has anyone got some evidence based information on bacterial load of the waste after bokashi composting for example.
I look forward to the discussions.
Kind Regards
Francesca
Francesca
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