When fed-up Stephen Griffiths put up a sign telling people to clear up dog mess in his road, he didn’t mean they should shove two bagfuls through his door instead.

Islington Gazette: Stephen Griffiths with dog poo on Spears Road. Picture: Polly Hancock.Stephen Griffiths with dog poo on Spears Road. Picture: Polly Hancock. (Image: Archant)

But when he went into his shed on Tuesday morning, two days after pinning the poster to his door, that’s exactly what he found.

The artist moved to Spears Road, Hornsey Rise, in September last year, and says it has been a problem since then.

“I’m not exaggerating,” he explained. “You have to walk down the street looking at the pavement constantly.

“We’ve only got houses down one side of the road and on my side most houses back onto it. People dump rubbish and all sorts. There’s dog s**t all over the pavement, you can’t walk on it. “I put up a sign saying ‘clean up your dog s**t’. This morning I went into my shed, which is on the front of the house and found two bags of it.”

Stephen has kicked up a stink with Islington Council about the faeces several times, but has given up after getting nowhere.

He instead took aim at the people responsible. “I’ve owned dogs myself and always cleaned up after them,” he said. “You have to put your hand inside a bag and it’s not a very pleasant feeling, but if you don’t like doing it, don’t have a dog. I guess people either can’t be bothered or they don’t like doing it.”

Stephen, who also mocked up a film poster with a dalmatian having a dump next to the words ‘coming to a shoe near you’, added: “The size of some of it made me wonder whether people were keeping an elephant as a pet.”

Community safety boss Cllr Andy Hull said he was “disgusted” to hear about the dirty protest.

“Islington Council will not tolerate such abuse of our residents,” he said, “and we invite Mr Griffiths to get in touch with us about this incident so that we can take action.

“We will also talk to him about the problem with dog mess in his road.

“If residents report dog mess, our street cleaning teams will respond. The easiest way to do this is via the free Clean Islington app. Residents can also call the council or use our website.

“We will continue to target dog mess hotspots for enforcement action.”