The Edinburgh Evening News front page last night was devoted to the story of Lottie a 4 year old Springer bitch stolen from a 10 year old litle girl in a posh area of the city. Two men and a boy bundled the dog into a car after threatening the girl and her friend and sped off. They were cool enough to use a local chippy and paper shop. Now that the paper has pointed out Lottie is chipped and spayed I dread to think what could happen to her. Its bad enough worrying about letting kids out to play, now the dogs are going to be living in protective custody too.

God, that's awful. The owners must be distraught. My Bess is a Springer and if anyone took her I couldn't bear it.

Please let us know if they find her.

Kath.

I couldnt bear the thought of anything like this. it makes me cringe!!!! I also have springers and would be distraught if anything happend to them. Also i hope the little girl is ok?

Brinny

My brother-in laws parents live in spain. They have a plot of land - their house is on one side and his uncle lives on the other. Two weeks ago whilst both families were out a van load of men turned up, emptied the uncle's house and stole their dog (small dog - yorkie I think). They then went to his parents house but were apparantley scared off by their dog (much larger crossbreed with very deep bark).

The owners of the yorkie have said they don't care about the frniture or money etc, they just want their dog back. Would feel exactly the same about mine.

I heard you shouldn't put your dog's name on their tag so any potential thief will have no idea what to call it.

The sad thing is that the thieves are probably stealing to order, I read that alot of gundog breeds get stolen and then imported to europe. I never leave my spaniels outside a shop, but you can't watch them all the time. I grew up walking my springer everywhere, isn't it sad to think that it is not safe for a child to take their dog for a walk round the block.
I don't have my dogs names on their tags, just my surname, but my lot would follow anybody home for a slice of bread.

Hello,

It's becoming more widespread though dog theft apparently according to my local BBC radio station they steal dogs wait for the owner to put up the reward then return the dog. But what else can you do but offer a reward? Scary though.

Karen

Ooh I'd never even thought of it from that angle. It *is* scary. Anyone could be lurking with a lump of meat. When I'm in the woods I'll be holding my breath every time she goes in the undergrowth until she reappears!!

Kath.

My husband says that he read that the dog had been found, can't remember where he read it as he was at work, good news anyway.

I think it's more likely that a pedigree will be insured (mine is) and our insurance offers a reward. Which may explain the kidnap to ransom (sort of thing).

Sarah

Count yourselves lucky you havn't got lurchers or a whippet like I do we get hassled by "travellers" all the time while out on walks, I'd love to know where they spring up from but we seem to bump into 1 at least once a week. They can get quite agressive when you refuse to let them use your dog on their bitch(their description not mine) but the thing that worries us is that on more than one occasion they have tried to follow us home.

my fiends kerry blues were stolen, and were found on a travellers site........

Yes Lottie was found dumped at Straiton, she was loose within yards of a VERY busy road and picked up by a chap out for a walk who recognised her from the paper. Last night featured rescue centres broken into and dogs stolen to order, especially staffs and bullmastiffs.

I am glad Lottie has been found. I drive myself crazy worrying about my children and now I'll be worrying about my dog too. Nothing is safe!

A 10 week old Rottie puppy has been taken for the Wisbech st Mary's area just down the road from us there are posters all over the town but in east anglia we have a high traveller community, 3 camps within 2 mile radius, there is also so chap in our local yellow paper advertising for Rottie, Dogue de Bordeaux, and GSD's "good homes waiting", in the same paper he has all 3 breeds with pups for sale, and then an advert for at stud in all three breeds. As I have one of the breeds wanted, it make's you wonder what kind of people are running this kind of set up and what they will do to acquire these breeds. I makes me wary of excercising our dog in our village as we are in the same telephone area as the advertiser.

An 8 month old beautiful black bullmastiff was stolen from the Dog and cat home in Glasgow the other day.He was waiting to go to a new home,and the thieves bypassed the security system,and only took him. The local paper published a pic of him,and they were afraid he was going to be used for fighting. However,probably because of the publicity, he was found yesterday tied up in a car park at the other side of the city. Someone recognised him from his picture.They said he has a wonderful temperament,and were really upset at the thought of him being used for fighting