Commercial dog walkers and land: Survey needs your input

The Kennel Club will publish its first UK-wide code of practice for commercial dog walkers this year.

The move is part of work to set standards to benefit land managers, dog owners and canine welfare alike. To ensure the code is as well-informed as possible, the Kennel Club is currently running an online survey to canvas the opinions and experiences of land and access managers.

The survey runs until 5th February 2016 and takes around 15 minutes to complete.

At the end, you can opt-in to obtain a summary of its results and be kept up to date on future developments. There’s also the chance to win tickets to the Crufts Dog Show at the NEC in March.

The Code of Practice aims to:

• minimise any problems for wildlife, livestock and other greenspace users

• help land managers deal with irresponsible dog walking

• help dog owners employ the most responsible CDW

• increase professionalism by all CDW

• improve dog safety and welfare

• help CDW be ambassadors for responsible dog ownership

Defra reported this month that 1.51 billion visits to the English countryside in 2015 included those walking with a dog. This accounts for 48% of total interactions with the countryside over the course of the year.

You can find the survey and more information here