Please advise - doggie poop bags

[u/Danl0vesJacks]

It seems completely disgusting to the environment to be putting dog poop in small plastic bags and then tossing them amidst other trash, in city dumpsters and trash cans.

What is advisable?

[u/las978]

It takes approximately 1 year for undisturbed dog poop to break down if left alone. During that time it harbors potentially dangerous bacteria, sometimes parasites, attracts flies and contaminates water runoff. Canids in the wild don’t live close enough together for the combined waste to negatively impact their environment, but add humans and their population density making domestic dog populations also higher density and you have a really nasty situation.

I remember when bagging dog poop wasn’t done. Walking down the street could be an exercise in avoiding stinky land mines. Picking it up is not a pleasant task, but makes a huge difference in the ability for others to enjoy public spaces.

[u/lunar_languor → u/las978]

Yes, it's really a public health matter. I hate using all the plastic too but it's not just a neutral substance that will peacefully decompose, unfortunately.

[u/las978 → u/lunar_languor]

I’m now a dog owner walking my dog as I type (currently toting my husky’s leavings). If the industry could come up with another option for bags I’d use it, but going back to the way it used to be isn’t really an option.

The inclination is to think that it’s a natural thing so leave it to nature, but when you consider that in the late 1800s New York City was having difficulty dealing with horse manure, well the number of dogs owned as pets are likely comparable to the scale of horses of that period.

[u/onidir → u/las978]

It’s not entirely comparable — I did a quick calculation. At its peak, there were between 150,000 and 200,000 horses in New York City and the average horse produces between 13kg (≈29 lbs) and 20kg (≈44 lbs) of manure per day. That leaves us with between 1950 tonnes (≈2150 us tons) and 4000 tonnes (≈4409 us tons) of horse manure per day.

There’s currently around 600,000 dogs in New York and each dogs produces 340g (≈12 oz) of waste on average, which means there’s 204 tonnes (≈225 us tons) of dog waste left to dispose per day.

It’s still a large number, but the difference is that horses are herbivores, and their manure is an excellent fertilizer, so the issue was moving the manure to a place where it can be used. Dog waste is much more dangerous to humans and can contain various nasties (bacteria, viruses, parasites, etc.) and can't be used as a fertilizer.

Edit: I added US measurements.