Dog owner Nicky Moffatt was astonished when she was asked to pay damages after her Jack Russell Rudi piddled on a plant outside Floral Culture.

The owner of the florists on Market Place did not take kindly to him marking his territory on her stock.

Miss Moffatt, 42, said she was asked by the shop owner to pay the price of the plant, £15.

Feeling intimidated, she handed over a tenner which was what she had in her purse at the time.

Florist Sarah Lax said pet owners needed to be more careful about where they let their animals water the plants.

She said: “The leaves were burned. I am a small business; I can’t afford to have stock ruined.”

But freelance journalist Miss Moffatt, of Bentley Grove, Calne, said her two-year-old rescue dog only peed on the pot.

She said: “I’m shocked that she would take my money for something a watering can would have fixed. I said several times I was really, really sorry.

“Rudi is deaf so is not able to communicate in the normal way that other dogs would be able to.”

Mrs Lax said she donated the £10 to the PC Nicola Hughes memorial fund.

She said: “We’ve no problem with dogs coming in the shop but we hope owners will keep an eye on what they are doing.”

Mrs Lax said Miss Moffat could have the mini fir tree which Rudi had peed on, but she said: “I don’t want it. I don’t have a garden.”