Casper, the wander dog

A serial wandering dog is driving a Masterton man to distraction.

Owen Marron said the labrador called Casper had been impounded about 20 times after straying into other people's properties.

Four of those occasions came after Mr Marron, who lives in Hogg Cres, contacted the dog ranger.

One of his neighbours had called the ranger over Casper on two other occasions and Mr Marron said he had been told of 13 other times Casper had been picked up.

"He's actually a lovely family dog and he probably gets out because kids leave the gate open.

"But that's not the point. He's coming on to other people's properties at all hours. He needs to be kept in."

A spokesman for the council said Casper was in the pound, where he had been since Sunday.

He said Casper had recently been neutered and efforts were being made to find a new home for him. Unfortunately, the first attempt at doing that was unsuccessful. He said Casper was registered and was not dangerous. The property where he used to live was fully fenced. The spokesman could not confirm how many times Casper had been impounded, but believed it to be less than 20.

An unrelated dog named Casper was last year classified as menacing.