As we stated in our last post, we started the Kenilworth Coiler Study because of the amount of unpicked up poops we saw as we walked our dogs in our neighborhood. Mainly because my dog Nero likes to eat the poop he finds in the world, then gets sick…which is not great especially since he is getting older. For a whole month, we would pick up and log (no pun intended) every poop we find during our walks. We would notate where we found them, estimate how old they are, total up how many are found each night and how much they weighed in total.
We hope people will learn from this study and it’s results, encouraging them to clean up after their dogs and maybe pick others up that our found in the world.
The Results Are In!
To summarize, we found a total of 131 individual dog poops weighing 289 ounces or 18 pounds!! That is crazy! The total weight is deceiving based on the number of poops in total found!
Basically, for those that were under 2.5 Oz, we considered them Little Dog poops. There were 42 in total. For those that were over 2.5 Oz, they were considered Big Dog poops, which there were a whopping 70 individual poops! There were also 19 unknowns since we couldn’t determine the sizing based on their current appearances (smooshed, flattened, jerkified.)
Of the 131 poops, we also estimated the timing of when they were left based on their appearance, and well…crunchiness. We estimated that 61 were left within 1 – 4 hours and 70 within one day to up to 5 days prior.
Then we started to recognize the same dog’s poop being left more often then not. We started to call that dog, Choco. We found this very healthy dog’s poop on 14 of the 31 days. There was probably more out there that we missed that may have been hidden by leaves or washed away from rain before we could get there….or eaten by other animals. They were always in hot zone one on Romany Rd and consistently weighed between 5-6 Oz.
I have compiled supporting data for this study that includes screen grabs of the map showing the routes we walked (or could have walked in that area). I have included a few above for reference. We made notations where we found the poops (using a “x” on the map), their sizing (LD, BD, or UNK) and our estimated timing of when they were dropped (W1H, W4H, W1D, 1D+, etc). I have also included some notes each day that speak to the weather, moon positioning, sky brightness, anything related to to any of the data collected as well as the time of that night’s walk. The file is large, so I included a compressed version in the Dropbox folder. If you have issues opening the main file, please try the compressed one.
We plan on conducting this study multiple times during the year going forward. After doing this a few times, we think the data collected will be interesting and hopefully even more educational. At the very least, it will clean up the neighborhood for that month. We are curious how much we would find at different times of the year. Will there be more in the spring/summer then the fall/winter? Does the weather and temperatures effect the pick-up/leave-it decision making?
Would you be interested in conducting a study in your own neighborhood? Let me know! I can give u some recommendations and show you what we did. Contact us at Mypets@umbrellapets.net for more information. Otherwise, let us know if you have any questions or what you think of these results below (or on Nextdoor if that is how you found us).
During the time of the 2020 Covid quarantine, everyone was forced to stay home to try and reduce the spread of this new disease. We did what everyone else probably did…we watched practically every Netflix show, did all the at home activities we can think of, and took several walks with our dogs…which led us down a path of discovery.
As we walked the neighborhood every night, we would talk about the number of poops that we see that were not picked up by their owners night after night, day after day. There have been an influx of dogs, and their poop, because of all the new, large apartment buildings that have gone up over the last couple of years. It was frustrating to see all these unpicked up poops because we always pick up after our dogs. I had tobecause my small, black, Boston Terrier, Nero has a disgusting habit…. prepare yourself for the grossness …it’s eating both his own poop (autocoprophagia) and poop from other dogs (allocoprophagia)1. So he will go after his own, his house mates, anyone staying with us and worst of all, any that he finds in the world!
Let me first say that we have been working with dogs (training, pet sitting, dog walking, etc) for the past 15 years and are aware of the reasons for dogs to eat poop (isolation, anxiety, attention seeking, etc). We have tried everything to stop this disgusting habit including (but not limited to) changing his diet (if you didn’t know, this takes a long time), treating a ground lump with deterrents (spicy stuff, sour stuff, etc..), taking him to multiple vet visits, feeding him pumpkin, banana, various vitamin and enzyme supplements, and other proposed edible solutions, he would just power thru and chomp away. We also tried using various types of muzzles but his little smooshed face is not the easiest to muzzle and he is obviously not a fan of wearing it. We also tried other various training aids, commands and styles, but nothing works. He just loves the stuff, can’t get enough of it! We try to keep him close in certain areas but we also want him to be able to enjoy the walks. At a point you just accept this is a behavior we have to deal with and try to remove any ground snacks.
The reason why he loves the stuff is more about his formative puppy years. He was a rescue that we adopted when he was 4 from a Florida rescue shelter. He is now 11. The rescue told us his history for he was surrendered by his original owner. The couple bought him when he was a young puppy. The couple did not spend much time on training for he had none when we got him. They kept him in a bathroom for several hours a day and even overnight, basically teaching him to go to the bathroom there and not outside. He would then turn around and eat the poop since it was not being cleaned up quickly and probably was not being fed on a regular basis so developed the taste and this… well…fetish.
Due to Nero’s affinity, we clean up in our own yard all the time but the problem is he finds them out in the world. The neighborhood is loaded with poops not being picked up, so Nero finds them out on our walks, especially at night. We then started, well were forced to, pick up those we see in the neighborhood usually because he has just found it and tried eating it. We try to stop him but he is smart.
He has learned how to hide it and eat it before we notice. He is low to the ground, black and quick. He could be “smelling” a tree or tall grass, before I know it, he has found some disgusting morsels of jerky and already swallowed some. We upped our flashlight game so we can see what he is smelling, and again, in certain areas we just don’t let him venture and smell.
If this article has piqued your interest so far, you are probably a dog owner and can relate to our frustration….or you annoyingly have stepped in it yourself.
As dog owners, when it comes to their health, we tend to talk about our dog’s poop…a lot. If our dogs are not feeling well, we look at their poop. Is it normal…or not so much? If not so much, what is causing it and how do we fix it? We give them meds, or a bland diet, or something else. Then once they start pooping normal again, we know they are feeling better. Nero’s poops always tend to be on the not so good side because of this obsession… plus he will show signs of lethargy and lack of appetite…which of course worries us. We have worked with the vet, we have tried everything to stop this habit but nothing worked since we cannot control the bad habits of other dog owners in the world.
Poop with worms
Him being sick all the time led me to further researching the illnesses as well as the effects on the environment. According to the CDC website, Campylobacter, Giardia, hookworm and roundworm are just a few of the parasites that are spread via dog’s poop2. More than 2 million cases of campylobacter infection happen each year in the United States, and C. jejuni is now the leading cause of bacterial gastroenteritis. These infections are contagious, especially among members of the same family and kids in childcare or preschools3. “Toxocariasis is an illness caused by the parasitic roundworm Toxocara, which lives in the sintestines of dogs and cats. The eggs from the worms are passed in the feces of dogs and cats, often contaminating soil where kids play. When a child ingests the contaminated soil, the eggs hatch in the intestine and the larvae spread to other organs, an infection known as visceral larva migrans.”3
We have spent hundreds of dollars treating the associated sicknesses. He has been diagnosed with hookworm and Giardia a few times at this point. If only he would put the association together that eating those morsels make him feel sick. The most frustrating part is that we could have a good couple of weeks where he hasn’t eaten any, then one night he finds one rogue poop and is sick again for the next week or so. We actually like to walk certain areas because we don’t expect many to be left unpicked up, but we can never be too sure. We always end up finding one or two even in the most pristine of neighborhoods.
Now dogs are not the only ones that can get sick too! Children and their families can also get sick. They walk those streets and play in those parks. They can possibly spread it to other family members and other animals. Imagine this scenario…a bunch of kids are playing in a park.
One kid unknowingly steps on an unpicked up poop, carries it home on their shoes…tracks it on the carpet and furniture. One would hope the adults would see the visible matter on the shoes/floor but there are minuscule eggs, worms and bugs that could still be spread even if the matter is cleaned. Then what if there is a baby in that house? The baby plays on that floor and gets the fecal or other minuscule matter on their hands. The baby then puts his hands in his mouth and gets sick from ingesting the fecal matter! That fecal matter could have also infected the other adults, kids and animals in the home. All could have been prevented if that poop was just picked up!! During an afternoon walk one day, we actually saw a child slip and fall on a large poop on a sidewalk while walking with his family. It freaked out the kid, was all over their shoes and now butt and back, and the parents had to rush home to clean off their child and end their nice walk. We tried to help but the child was very understandably upset about getting poop all over him. Just another unfortunate incident that would never have happened if the poop was just picked up!!
Diseases from dog poop is not the only reason dog waste is harmful. Feces in the water supply contributes nutrients that lead to overgrowth of harmful algae and weeds, killing fish and other wildlife. Many may think it will fertilize the ground and help, but it is actual very toxic. The EPA lists dog poop on its list of non-point sources of environmental contamination for with more than 70 million dogs in the United States alone, they can produce over 10 million tons of poop each year. Pet waste left on the street or lawn does not just go away or fertilize the grass. Rain washes pet waste down storm drains and into waterways like rivers, bays, and beaches. This can make people sick from salmonella, E. coli, and other infections. Pet waste is very toxic—the Environmental Protection Agency estimates that waste produced by just 100 dogs in two or three days (or one weekend) can contain enough bacteria to temporarily close a bay to swimming and shellfishing. Pet waste also provides a nitrogen source for algae blooms, which deplete the water of oxygen and can make people and animals sick.” 4
So we continued to walk the neighborhoods every night. After picking up at least one or two rogue poops a couple of times a week, for a couple of months, so Nero couldn’t eat them, we started to wonder just how many poops are out there in our neighborhood. If we actually started looking for them, just how many would we find? We expected it would be a lot. While we walked, we also discussed the reasons behind why people are not cleaning up after their dogs.
There are all the excuses like “I forgot a bag”, “I couldn’t see it”, “It’s not in a walkway”, “I don’t want to carry the gross bag with me”, or “There is no nearby waste station”. We wonder, do they think someone else is doing it therefore they do not have to do it? Is it ignorance or just defiance? Would learning about the effects on other animals, their neighborhoods, and the environment help convince them to actually clean up after their dog? We hoped so!
Because we were picking up Nero found poops anyway, we decided to make it more beneficial to the neighborhood (and make it fun for ourselves), so we launched the Kenilworth Coiler Study 2020! For one whole month, we would pick up and log every poop we find during our walks. We would notate where we found them, estimate how old they are, total up how many are found each night and how much they weighed in total. We (my husband and I) even had a little competition between us as to who can find the most during the month…I won because I had Nero looking for them ?. In the end, we were surprised on the sheer number and the relative total weight we found in a small 1/3 of a mile radius of Kenilworth Ave.
In summary, we started this as a way to clean up our neighborhood, stop Nero from getting sick, and because we were bored during quarantine. We publish our history, the reasons why, what we learned and the results with the hope that maybe it will change some perspectives and motivate others to pick up the poop. Maybe seeing the sheer numbers found in just this small neighborhood, they will reconsider leaving their poop unpicked up in the future. If there was that much in my small neighborhood, how much is in your neighborhood?
So now onto the good stuff…the study, it’s criteria, details…and the crazy results…
Picked up that same dog’s poop 14 of the 31 days!!
Study Criteria & Details
The things we took into consideration and the details we defined are as follows:
Poops were included in the counts if found between Oct 1st and Oct 31st. (It took us a while to compile the results and put it into an easily readable and understandable format.)
The majority of poops were collected during our evening walk anytime between 8-12 pm every day.
Dog Sizes were determined based on the estimated size of the poop. Little Dog (LD) are poops that were smaller diameter and weighed under 2.5oz. Big Dog (BD) are poops that were larger in diameter and over 2.5 Oz.
The estimated timing was also considered.
If the poop seemed fresh and still had a “sheen”, we estimated it was dropped within the last hour (W1H) to last 4 hours (W4H).
If the poop did not have the sheen but was not yet very crunchy, we estimated it was dropped sometime during that day (W1D).
If the poop was just starting to get a little crunchy, we estimated it was dropped a day or so ago (1D+).
If the poop was a bit more crunchy, we estimated it was dropped 2 days or so ago (2D+).
If the poop was even more crunchy, we estimated it was dropped 3 days or so ago (3D+).
If the poop was a dried up piece of jerky, we estimated dropped 5 days or so ago (5D+).
If the timing of the poop was not able to be determined due to it being smeared, squished, flattened or loose, we counted it under the “unknown” heading.
Routes Traveled
We walked the neighborhood every night and stayed within a 1/3 mile radius of the corner of Kenilworth Ave & Romany Road. We traveled various paths though so not to walk the same roads every night. Some nights we just walked around Latta Park, some nights we also walked around the Cathedral of Saint Patrick School. Some nights we walked down to East Blvd and around Harris Teeter or around all the condos and apartments between Scott and Kenilworth. Other nights we walked down to the Little Sugarcreek Greenway walkway or around the hospital and down the sugar creek water path. Sometimes we walked through the residential areas down Belgrave and Berkeley or down through the other half of Latta Park between W Park and Romany.
Hot spots and Choco the Repeat Offender
A week or so into the study, we started to see hot spots and even repeat offenders. The corner of Romany and Kenilworth down Romany, following the sidewalk and over the bridge was the first hot spot. The second was all around the Camden Dilworth Apartments on Pierce and Buchanan streets. We found sometimes 6 or more poops in the first hot spot and upwards of 15 or more on the second! That was just on one night too! We made sure to visit hot spot 1 every night but would visit hot spot 2 at least once or twice a week.
Hot Spot One
We also started to recognize poops that just had to come from the same dog. As dog owners, we recognize poop. Also as a pet sitter, we can recognize poops from multiple dogs. These specific poops were always in the same general area (hot spot 1) and looked identical to those from the nights before…so much so that we started calling that dog “Choco”. Gotta say the dog is very healthy for they were always healthy looking poops! That’s great but also gotta say it started to get more and more frustrated because we were seeing their poop almost every day. Turns out that we actually picked up Choco’s poop at least 14 of the 31 days!! Those are only the ones we found also. We are sure there was many we didn’t find because they may have been covered by leaves, washed away by rain, eaten by other dogs/animals or stepped in and carried through the neighborhood.
Can you guess how many ounces in total we found? Or the number of individual poops we found? Stay tuned for the results…
There are several holidays that we can celebrate with our furry family members. Here is a list of those holidays and special months… will you celebrate with us?
Thank you to DogTipper.com for this awesome list of holidays!
Roxie is such the little playdog sometimes! She often relaxes on one of her 3 beds or the couch in such adorable positions that I swear she is posing for the camera!
This was the first picture we ever took of her…not the clearest but look how small she is??
So as I catch her in those poses, I will add them to this post.
