The owner of a german shepherd dog left tied to a post in their Colindale garden while he went on a two-week holiday with his family said it was the best available option.

Paul Rowell, 39, went to Newquay in Cornwall, on July 22 last year with his wife, Leanne Cobb, 27, and their three children, leaving their six-year-old dog Khan tethered to a concrete post at their Colin Gardens home.

Rowell told Barnet magistrates on Thursday last week that he had tried to make arrangements with friends to keep the dog before they left, but no-one was available.

"We considered kennels but the average one is eight foot by three foot," he said.

"At the end of the day, the dog is used to freedom, and it would have been even more upsetting to have been in a tiny box."

Rowell and Cobb both deny charges of animal cruelty, brought after RSPCA inspector David Long discovered Khan five days after the family had left, with only two feet of rope length to move in, with hardly any food, water or shelter.

Rowell said that he had kept dogs since he was a child and had worked as a dog handler for a security firm, looking after rottweilers and alsatians.

Khan had been with the family for 18 months when he was removed by the RSPCA, he said, and had the freedom of the house and garden.

"We found him to be a loveable, well-disciplined dog," Rowell said. "He would prefer to be outside, even in the snow. We had a shed in the garden available to him, but he refused to use it."

The trial is due to be continued at Barnet Magistrates Court on December 3.

October 23, 2001 16:15

JULIAN HILLS