The Italian tourist was very upset when she concluded her motoring holiday which had included sightseeing in the scenic Comeragh Mountains of Co Waterford.
She wrote a letter to the then president, Mary Robinson, including Ordnance Survey co-ordinates of the locations where she came upon a phenomenon which had disturbed her, the practice by some hill-farmers of leaving their dogs tied for days on end at the bottom of boreens or tracks leading from sheep-grazing land.
This has been an active concern of the Waterford Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, which finds itself in somewhat of quandary over how to abolish, or at least modify, this practice, according to its secretary, Angela McCarthy.
The intention of the farmers, apparently, is that the presence of the dog will deter sheep from wandering from their own territory. Ms McCarthy says the dogs are left "sometimes with no water, very little food, no company and very little shelter or bedding.
"They are tied with a bit of rope or a piece of chain and usually with a little hovel or hut beside them. These shelters are completely inadequate, not waterproof or windproof. I have seen some with streams of water flowing underneath them. The animal has nowhere dry to lie," she says.
"The farmers will say they keep their dogs there mainly because it's a tradition to do so and because they can then be seen to be doing something about keeping the sheep in one place, but in fact it doesn't work. I have photos of a flock of sheep actually walking past one of these dogs. If the dog is new it will be very enthusiastic, but after a while the sheep get used to the dog and vice-versa."
The SPCA gets "an enormous number" of complaints about this, particularly from tourists, both Irish and foreign. "They are horrified at it and regard it as primitive and they can't believe in some cases that they are actually seeing this in a civilised country.
"We're at the receiving end of these complaints and we're perceived as doing nothing about it, which puts us in a very unfortunate situation as well because we are actually trying very hard to reach some sort of solution."
She suggests the practice is doubly cruel because these are of ten working dogs, used to covering 60 miles or more a day when working. Some are fed daily, but with others it is hit-and-miss.
The SPCA says it is not illegal to tie a dog. "Obviously, it's illegal to cause unnecessary suffering, but the problem is that we haven't got the personnel to go up there and monitor them 24 hours a day." It is also reluctant, in many cases, to take a legal approach "because we feel we would rather persuade the farmers to stop doing this altogether."
The SPCA has talked to some, but admits it encountered "a fairly negative reaction". Ms McCarthy comments: "I think they don't appreciate what they see as interference." Some farmers, however, agreed to put proper collars on their animals rather than leave them tethered with baling twine.
The number of cases is difficult to estimate, as the SPCA and the public only see those in the vicinity of public roads, but at times of the year when the sheep are on high ground, there are certainly dozens of dogs tied up throughout the Comeraghs. The society does not rule out taking legal action in particular cases, in spite of the difficulties of proof and so on. One suggestion has been the placing of grids across the roads in question, similar to cattle grids.
The SPCA has talked to the county council, and the matter is under consideration in some areas, but the council is reluctant to implement this generally because of the high capital cost and insurance considerations.