A dog may be man's best friend but it doesn't feel that way to parents who have seen their child fall into a pile of poo in the park. It happens with distressing regularity.

Apart from the all too obvious problems of smell and dirt, there is also a small but real risk of serious diseases being transmitted to children through the mess. Dogs and public areas such as parks simply do not go together.

Up to about 20 years ago, most dog owners were indiscriminate about where their pets pooped with the result that many urban parks simply became no-go areas. Then, in one of those social changes that occasionally happen, parents became militant about poo.

They harassed dog owners and councils to such an extent attitudes changed. Local authorities started poop scoop schemes and the majority of owners started cleaning up after their pets.

The success of the clear up operation and the scale of the problem can be judged as within a few months of its starting in Hove, half-a-ton of poop was being deposited in the special bins every week.

The change was so noticeable it almost became possible to walk in some parks again, albeit with caution. But I am not alone in detecting a deterioration recently. The father of a three-year-old boy in Wish Road, Hove, was so concerned he wrote to his councillor, Heather James, about it.

A council dog warden came down to Wish Park, not the biggest of open spaces, and noticed no fewer than 160 poops close to the perimeter path. These were duly removed and prominent warning signs placed in the park.

But within four days, dog owners had ripped down the notices and continued as before, letting their pets deposit another 100 piles of poo in this popular park.

What is the solution? Confronting owners can make a difference but the minority prepared to pull down notices and let their dogs carry on pooping is unlikely to contain particularly pleasant people, sometimes with pets to match. A confrontation could be damaging for parent and child.

Prosecution is always an option but there has to be a witness and not everyone wants to spend a day in court. Despite the huge amount of fouling in the city, summonses are remarkably rare.

If the owners, even if only a minority, cannot be trusted to keep parks clean, more drastic measures must be taken. In Wish Park, it would be easy to create a dog area of some size just west of the playground and bar the rest of the park to animals.

This would also involve putting higher fences and gates around the park so dogs could not get in at night and in the early morning. This is undoubtedly when most of the fouling takes place, when owners think no one is watching.

It would also enable parents and children to use open spaces such as Wish Park really safely. At present, even if a poop has been scooped it has still been there on the ground, which is not a pleasant thought when kids are playing there later.

There will be protests as most pooch owners will no more go in a dog area than they used Hove's infamous dog toilets in the Sixties. They don't want to tread in the muck themselves.

The overriding difficulty is there are far too many dogs in cramped urban areas such as Brighton and Hove, which is not fair on people or pooches. Most dogs like the freedom of wide open spaces. While there are so many animals in so confined an area, there is bound to be conflict.