Dog owners are being asked to show respect for the dead following complaints they are exercising their pets in a cemetery.

People have found dog mess on some of the graves in Longcross Cemetery, Dartmouth, because pet owners are not controlling their animals adequately, said the town's deputy clerk Tracy Rowe.

'People have even been seen throwing balls for their pets in the cemetery,' she said.

She said that pet owners were continuing to exercise their dogs in the council-owned cemetery, despite signs on the gate telling them it is forbidden.

'There is no problem with people taking their dogs into the cemetery to visit their loved one's graves but they are not to be exercised in there,' she said.

'There is a large piece of land on the other side of the leisure centre they could walk their dogs on and that is just a few hundred yards further up the road.'

She said the council had had one complaint from an angry resident who had confronted a dog owner clearly exercising his pet in the cemetery and was told: 'I'm sure the dead don't mind.'

She said there had been problems with people taking their dogs into the cemetery to exercise them for around a year.

At one point there was a spate of vandalism when the signs asking people not to exercise their animals there had been ripped down.

She said pet owners were welcome to take the dogs in the cemetery to visit graves but they should keep them on a lead.

Dartmouth's new vicar, the Rev Will Hazlewood, said he had carried out the service for two burials at the cemetery.

He said: 'I have no issue with people taking dogs into the graveyard but obviously I would want people to think twice about what they allow their dogs to do.

'As a dog owner myself, I find it bad enough when you step in something on the pavement or walking around the back of the playing fields where I exercise my own dog.

'Imagine the distress it could cause someone who is recently bereaved and find something like that on the grave of someone they loved. I would say put yourself in the shoes of someone who might be mourning someone immensely special to them.'

He said that the space in cemeteries are often 'precious' to people and 'people need to be respectful of that'.

A spokesman for South Hams Council said: 'South Hams Council can issue fixed penalty notices to dog owners who do not clear up after their dog under the Dog (Fouling of Land) Act 1996.

'The district council has recently sanctioned the drafting of new dog control orders for the South Hams. This process will include extensive public consultation and engagement with town and parish councils and addresses issues relating to exercising dogs as well as fouling.

'In the meantime, town and parish councils are legally able to enforce their local laws where these are in place.'