Owner of Yorkshire riding school fined for allowing her three Labradors to worry her neighbour's sheep

Sarah-Jane Kendall, 52, was convicted after trial of being the owner of three Labradors which worried livestock on farmland in Skipton-on-Swale, near Thirsk, belonging to farmer Phillip John Wise, who videoed the incident on his phone.

Ms Kendall’s dogs had swum across a river and encroached into a 12-acre field where sheep were grazing and started barking at the animals, Harrogate Magistrates Court heard.

Mr Wise shouted at and shooed the dogs away after spotting them on his land, said prosecutor Jody Beaumont.

He added: “Mr Wise…noticed three labradors all barking aggressively towards the sheep. He chased the dogs and separated (his livestock) from the dogs. He said his sheep were in fear and were being worried at the time.”

Ms Kendall, who owns the neighbouring Bridge End Farm and a riding school in Howe, Thirsk, wasn’t present at the time as she was tacking a horse for an equestrian lesson.

She denied that her dogs had scared the sheep, claiming there was no livestock in the field at the time and disputing that they were on agricultural land belonging to her neighbour.

However, Mr Beaumont pointed out that the Crown needed only to prove that the dogs had been “at large” on agricultural land where sheep were present for there to be sufficient evidence of worrying livestock.

He said there could be no doubt that the dogs were scaring the animals and that the footpath was on agricultural land, which the defence disputed.

Mr Wise told the court his sheep were lambing at the time of the incident on April 11.

“I was in the farmyard and heard dogs barking in the field where my sheep were,” he added.

He said there were about 60 “in-lamb” sheep in the field and he saw three labradors running around and “barking at the sheep, at me and anything else that was in there”.

“All the sheep were scared,” he added.

“I walked down to try and get the dogs to leave the field. I put myself in between the dogs and the sheep to stop anything from happening.”

Mr Wise said his sheep were hiding from the dogs and that he followed the labradors which ran back to their home across an adjacent field and a bridge over the River Swale and the A61.

Ms Kendall’s lawyer Martin Townend said the dogs had been on the riverbank, a public right of way, about 150 metres away from the sheep, when they were spotted by Mr Wise and posed no risk to the sheep.

He said that because there was only video footage of one of the labradors on the riverbank and footpath at one end of the field, and no footage of livestock or of sheep bleating, there was no proof there had been any incursion onto agricultural land or the worrying of farm animals.

Mr Townend suggested to the farmer that he had a beef with Ms Kendall who had become “a bit of an outsider” in the village after buying Bridge End Farm 14 years ago.

He put it to Mr Wise that, according to Ms Kendall, he “resented” her because he believed that a “distant relative” had left him the property in a will. Mr Wise disputed this claim.

Ms Kendall said she took her eyes off her dogs while saddling up a horse at her stables, but that they returned home a short time later after crossing the river into the neighbouring farmland.

She said that her three dogs, a 14-year-old chocolate labrador, a three-year-old fox-red lab called Leo and his sister, were family pets and she also had 11 sheep and 36 horses.

She said her dogs had never chased or been aggressive towards sheep in the village. Mr Townend claimed that Mr Wise’s complaint was informed by “some animus between the parties”.

The magistrates’ bench found that Ms Kendall’s labradors were “at large” in an agricultural field with sheep present and therefore in the eyes of the law they were worrying livestock.

They found Ms Kendall guilty as charged, but noted the prosecution’s own assertion that the resultant fine should be kept to a minimum because there had been no previous reports of the dogs running loose on Mr Wise’s land.

The magistrates’ bench also noted that Ms Kendall had since taken measures to prevent her dogs roaming on her neighbour’s land off Catton Road.

Ms Kendall was fined £230 and ordered to pay trial costs of £400, along with a £92 statutory surcharge.