UKC

As sure as night follows day, in no more than a couple of days all talk in these pages will give way to a tide of almost identical threads appearing on the theme of "A firework made my dog unhappy. Fireworks must therefore be banned"

This comes up every year about now, repeatedly, and reliably. I'll say up front I don't have any particular allegiance to either but before you start calling for banning something I thought we could have our annual objective look, lightly updated for 2022, at which we'd have to get rid of if we were genuinely acting for the greater good. We can gather some stats to inform any debate that follows.

Let's take the regularly cited discussion points one by one...

1. Injuries

W39 Discharge of firework: 131 admissions, 184 bed days

W54 Bitten or struck by dog: 8758 admissions, 10551 bed days

Source: NHS Digital, Hospital Episode Statistics for England. Admitted Patient Care Activity [External causes], 2021-22 https://files.digital.nhs.uk/3C/F3A925/hosp-epis-stat-admi-ext-caus-2021-22...

2. Carbon footprint

London's NYE fireworks display: 262kg CO2

Source: https://www.london.gov.uk/sites/default/files/mgla021117-3038_-_attachment.... 

One dog: 770-2500kg CO2e/yr

(various sources; google it)

3. Noise

Animal noise seems to be the nuisance 3rd most complained about to local councils. Fireworks aren't in the top 10. https://www.directlinegroup.co.uk/en/news/brand-news/2020/09062020.html 

I did a bit more digging and found FOI requests to a load of councils. "The request was for the number of noise complaints made by the public with regard to fireworks and barking dogs." UKC spam filter doesn't like a sequence of characters that appears in the direct link, but search "fireworks-evidence-base-report.pdf"

There's a thread on a fireworks forum that has the responses here:

https://www.fireworks-forum.org.uk/threads/guidance-from-the-british-firewo... 

and the responses are collated here:

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/... 

Now, you might be concerned about bias creeping in, since this is the fireworks industry. I was, so I checked a few. They seem verifiable:

https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/noise_complaints_received_for_th 

https://www.scarborough.gov.uk/opendata/foi-disclosure-log/noise-complaints... 

Looks like there are a few hundred noise complaints about barking dogs for every one complaint about fireworks.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-suffolk-33534403 roughly supports that ratio too with 3454 to 16. As does https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/noise_complaints_2275#incoming-21151... with 319 to 4. In fact there are loads of FOI requests that corroborate this at https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/list/successful?utf8=%E2%9C%93&query=fir...

So a couple orders of magnitude in it whichever numbers you choose.

4. Spent fireworks littering the countryside

Do we even need to cover this? Those plastic bags aren't full of spent fireworks.

5. Stressing livestock

Hard to find out numbers on how many livestock don't recover after hearing loud bangs, but easy to find out how many are killed by dogs: https://www.gov.scot/publications/sheep-attacks-harassment-research/pages/2...

Now to be clear I really don't care either way and am simply trying to get some hard data out there before the high horses are all saddled up. But if you're clamouring for banning one or t'other and choosing objectively, it's not looking great for Fenton.

My dog loves fireworks. Do I win a prize?

You need to get a hobby......

I have one but it needs better weather.

Good reply. Have a like 

An estimate here of annual costs of £22m for cleaning up dog fowling.  As far as I can tell, spent fireworks generally rot away without presenting a hazard to public health.

https://hackney.gov.uk/dog-fouling

I have removed an infinite amount of dog muck from my local PRoW for each spent firework I have found…

Been going off for a week! Went Tesco’s at dinner and they have a firework stall. A hoodie was buying some. Contemplated taking him out with an aubergine.

My mood was lifted at the till when over the tannoy someone on customer services asked for a Mr William Shakespeare to come to the desk)) Hahahah that was funny

Best bit of bonfire night in my youth was taking apart all the different fireworks, rockets, shotgun cartridges etc and making new stuff to go bang with the bits.

Tried the same approach with pets. Never quite as successful 

Burn him!!! Burn him, along with his facts!!!

You should include Divali in your research, please - there's a large Indian population around where I am and it was like WW3 out there earlier. Neighbours last seen sweeping up a hefty pile of spent cases from the road.

I'd also like to see your research on getting a tired small child into bed while it's all going on

Rabbits, OTOH, seemed unfazed when I checked on them - barely a response when a particularly loud firework went off overhead.

You've never been to any easily accessible moorland car park surrounding any of the major (and minor!) northern towns and cities, especially in the time surrounding any religious festival or national holiday or celebration then? I think there's been fresh firework detritus every single time I've been to Buckstones Edge (Nont Sarah's)! 

I can say for sure without thinking about it there's been dog crap every time I've been to an accessible moorland car park. You can almost navigate by working out your distance to a car park by the frequency of bagged turds.

And the paper and card of fireworks might slowly degrade away because nobody's meticulously picking up the fireworks and wrapping them in plastic bags before leaving them right back where they were, as if trying to preserve them for future generations as a monument to where they emptied the dog.

How about those humans who don’t do loud noise, such as the elderly, some with PTSD, and younger ones with some learning issues.  These all are affected too.

On the noise complaints issue, who bothers anymore complaining about nuisance noise from early fireworks, little to no point.  So your ration has a massive amount of bias 

See #3. Barking dogs not best known for their calming influence on those groups.

Same round here, didn't stop until gone midnight. I havnt set off to work yet but last year rather than clean up the fireworks, some up to 2 foot Square were just left in the road and on the pavements. Still not as bad as the number of Dickheads who don't clean up after their dog though. 

Rabbits are tough buggers, we had 4 house rabbits, only one left now and he brooks no nonsense from the dogs, there is a play tube in our living room that he seems to have decided anything east of his his territory and if the does pass that line he sees them off. 

It's two hundred to one. Just think about how much "it's biased" you have to hand wave away before the leaderboard changes.

Who bothers about complaining about barking dogs? You get the complaint noted and nothing is done, so its better to not bother, it only makes it harder when you move.

(Sat with headphones on at 7am as the lovely pooch next door is awake)

Turns out I was wrong, I didn't see a single firework on the street this year. Fair play.

My new next door neighbour seems to be a big man in the local Asian community and he was out with his family celebrating, I can only assume seeing him clear up prompted the others to do the same.

Pitty the scratty mess leaving dog walkers are white folk who don't come under his remit.

That by the way is an assumption, I have never seen anyone leaving dog shite on the path because I would have a word and the assumption is based on I have only ever seen white people walking dogs round our estate and if I'm out walking ours and Asians around take a wide berth even though my dogs are 2 small bundles of fluffy silliness. 

How about those who want to go for a run in the park without having to constantly dodge animal shit, tripwire "leads" and animals that fancy chewing on your heels?

I’m a dog owner, and too find these behaviours appalling.  I always pick up after my dog, keep him on a lead , and ensure runners, cyclists etc are not inconvenienced.  These behaviours are not the fogs fault, it’s the idiot owner.   This is not about Willie waving to see who’s more right.  It’s about reasonable behaviour from us all to each other, I enjoy fireworks, and though I’d like a full ban, that’s not likely.  So, I’d like those buying and using them to do so reasonably and respectfully.  To me, that doesn’t include randomly letting them off to for weeks ahead of Nov the 5th.  

Again, barking dogs is not the animals fault, it’s the idiot owner.  I’m not defending the dog here, but the owner needs to realise it’s an issue and get it sorted out.  I’m sat next door, and my hound is dozing quietly and never barks even when left for a period of time, it’s perfectly possible to achieve 

Oh yeah, I know. The response from the owner has been 'Piss off', and I've been advised that making an official complaint is only likely to make things worse. Knowing the owner is at fault rather than the dog doesn't make it any less infuriating

Well I’ve never duck-taped five dogs together with staggered fuses in an attempt to make a multi-stage dog…

Following on in the spirit of the OP; that same unarguable line can be applied to fireworks and to handguns.  We ban handguns because the harm from a very few idiot owners was judged to high, we don’t on dogs and we don’t on firework.  In terms of evidence of harm to humans, guns and dogs both fair worse than fireworks.  In all cases it’s the owner/user who carries the blame, but relative harm must be an input to a sane decision on bans.

Again, noisy fireworks is not the firework's fault, it’s the idiot owner. I’m not defending the firework here, but the owner needs to realise it’s an issue and get it sorted out. I’m sat next door, and my firework is dozing quietly and never goes off even when left for a period of time, it’s perfectly possible to achieve 

Nobody has so far come up with a way to make either firework or dogs ownership inaccessible to dickheads. That's beyond the scope of my OP. This was just about which ban would bring the greater objective benefit if it came to banning one or other.

I sincerely thank you for your post, we seem to have to live with dog owners for 365 day per year but with fireworks for only 7 days per year yet guess who tends to complain the most about each other? 

Both cause me problems, but I know which camp causes the most.

I think what this basically clarifies is the view I've held for a long time:

1. Owning a dog is a choice

2. Having fireworks is a choice

I can see no reason why either of those should override the other in either direction.  Thus people just need to be, you know, a bit considerate about how they do either of those things.

I wish fireworks were only 7 days per year. So far around here we've had 5 of those seven days already this year.

Dave

In my experience fireworks are nowhere near as bad as they used to be in the minirocket days.  A month either side of the 5th would see youths letting them off anywhere where they wouldn't be disturbed too much every night of the week.

We now have a public sales ban until the 1st, and organised displays are only allowed on the night and the nearest weekend, with the next weekend for bad weather contingency.  Seems to work pretty well.

I don't know why people feel the need to set off fireworks from anything up to 2 weeks before bonfire night. My poor dog has been hiding under the Christmas tree each evening.

You're conflating two independent things.  You can't justify the nuisance fireworks causes by pointing the finger at some other nuisance source (much as you'd obviously like to).  

To poke in my own n==1 sample.  My late father had increasing dementia towards the end of his life.  He also lived in a house with a frequently barking terrior on one side, and an occasionally barking Springer spaniel on the other.  Neither appeared to bother him in the slightest.  For the six weeks or so that "fireworks day" lasted, he became increasingly agitated as the much louder pyrotechnics were detonated.

In an earlier post you claimed no particular allegiance to either side. Yet in a thread some months ago you made the post: "Just remember this, and every other morning it happens, on bonfire night when they all start whinging." which doesn't feel like no particular allegiance to me.  

Only if you read each reply post in isolation taking great care to ignore the included text. I don't think you've understood the spirit of the OP. It was about which is worse. When asked "what about people who don't do loud noise" I pointed out that we'd covered that under heading 3. The bit about there being hundreds of times more complaints (presumably by people, presumably who don't like the noise) about animal noise than fireworks.

That's great for him.

And that's sad for him, but the n=lots sample seems to point very decisively the other way.

Well that's your presumption. That was on a thread whinging about dog owners iirc. Not sure how pointing out that dog owners would predictably start whinging in October puts me in either camp. I really am not fussed about either dogs or fireworks. People calling to ban A to appease B when B is demonstrably more detrimental than A though..... that's enough to make me post a paragraph of statistics.

Shotgun cartridges? How exactly the hell did you celebrate Guy Fawkes Night round your way?!

Yes that is the way here too. The Diwali celebrations(I assume they were for Diwali as there was nothing before) this year began last Thursday and every night since. 

Our dog does not like sudden noises of any kind and, although he is better than he was some years ago, he is not at all happy when he hears fireworks. Things quieted down enough for him to sleep at about 1:30 this morning, so it was another late night.

Guy Fawkes night(and for some days either side) is always a difficult time for him, as is Christmas and New Year.

Dave 

There might have been a problem with the winter discount tents

I should have added a smily face to show my comment was a joke, albeit a poor one.

Not poor, I enjoyed it (and it was better without a smiley face)!

Your post was too long - the joke only works if you read all the way to the end!

#ukcisthenewtwitter

Most likely it was much ado about nothing.

Surely the answer to both is to tax them.  There are far more pet dogs than there ever were in the past and far more fireworks.

Let people have them but tax them

Keswick I think could practically pay for the NHS with the number of dogs it harbours.

I’m just tying a bag of dog shit to a rocket. Does that work for the tread?

I use a stick to remove the bulk of the doggy doo dah from the deep tread, then a tooth brush to get into the nooks and crannies. 

Ok by me, lets say £500 a dog and 40% vat on fireworks.  I’d happily pay £500 for my dog.  The problem is enforcement, we used to have to have a dog licence.  We could add the fee on microchipping. This of course predicates that the people who don’t give two hoots now will engage.  Id also like,to,see tight window for use of fireworks too. 

I live fireworks. In fact, at Uni we used to fire them like rocket launchers when camping on caving trips.

Our dogs were always scared of them, but the quickly get over it.

The story that made me sad however was a radio call-in in where her dad had dementia and PTSD and every year would hide under the table when the fireworks went off. Breaks my heart that story.

I don't know how you would manage it, but I think there should be exclusion zones, where for whatever reason, particularly in urban areas, you can't use fireworks because there's a known receptor that could be affected.

Whose tooth brush?

I like it. Is that also how Bottom Clinger remove their bottom clingers?

Incidentally, no. BC OP'd one of the grimmest threads I ever had the misfortune to read on this matter. 

Strangely, that thread involved one of the two components of this thread. (Clue, not the fireworks)

Fully bleak. 

The first which comes to hand. I give it a good rinse afterwards though. 

You’ve just undone all the counselling I’ve been receiving. Back to square one. 

Don't worry. You'll get there with dogged determination.