Dog-gone it!

The BBQ Pit
1

I have two dogs - terriers - who are mostly indoor dogs. But when I’m home for a while, I let them out to run around in our fenced yard.

Every once in a while, they’ll bark at passers-by. If it’s too extended, I’ll shush them.

But in the last two weeks or so, they go ballistic in their barking all of the sudden. I go out to look, and there’s an elderly man walking his schnouser (sp?). But the man has extended his dogs leash so that his dog is right up at our fenceline, in our yard, 15 feet from roadway.

I ask him (over my dogs’ barking) to please move his dog along, as it’s antagonizing my pups. He’ll just stand there for another minute, then move along.

This morning, the same thing happened, only his dog was sitting in my wife’s flower bed (a small 3’ circle surrounded by brick). So aside from asking him to move his dog because of egging on my dogs, I also pointed out that the dog was in our flowers. Then he says something for the first time: “How’m I supossed to tell that a flowerbed? You’ve got bad dogs. Bad dogs.”

WTF!? They wouldn’t act “bad” if your dog (admittedly not barking itself) wasn’t sitting 1 foot from their fence and completely in our yard. And what is it about a 3 foot cleared area surrounded by decorative brick and filled with flowers that doesn’t give you the impression that it’s a flowerbed?

When I walk my dogs, mister, I keep them on the sidewalk or roadway. I only allow them in others yards when invited.

2

Uh, I think this means you have normal dogs. The neighbor’s dogs is on their territory.

My dogs bark like crazy too if another dogs goes by on the street. I can make them shut up (and usually do – since I have 4 dogs, keeping the noise level down and the neighbors relatively happy is important), but drat it, they’re going to bark.

The dog walker was out of line to let his dog come so far up on your yard. If the dog had crapped there, I bet he wouldn’t have picked it up, either.

3

Time to learn the phrase: “Get off my fucking lawn”. People like this don’t respond to reason, they really don’t. What a fucking idiot.

4

At least he keeps his dog on a leash - there’s a few folks around here that let their dogs run loose. My dogs hate that.

There is a teen age girl near me that lets her dog come up to our fence - our fence is a solid wood privacy fence though so there’s no contact, but our dogs know the other dog is out there.

Your dogs aren’t bad, the dog walker is bad for not respecting your property.

5

I don’t fault his dog at all. (I was going to title this thread “I’ll get you… and your little dog, too!”, but realized I wasn’t mad at the little guy.)

When I walk my dogs, they’re curious. But I hold them back if they try to go onto peoples’ yards. And try to get them to move along if they’re upsetting a dog that we pass.

And it’s not so much that the dog’s on our yard. It’s that he stops and lets out the leash so the dog can get closer to our fence. Then acts like nothing’s wrong.

If kids were coming up to our fence and dangling treats to cause our pups to bark insessantly, I’d certainly be in the right to ask them to leave.

Maybe I’ll snap a picture of him taunting my dogs next time. :smiley:

6

Spritz him with the water hose (the guy, not the dog!):smiley:

7

When I used to live in the city, and only had three dogs, the mail woman used to walk beside my fence on my neighbours lawn to get to the house behind us, rather than the sidewalk down the block. Not that I cared or anything, but one day I see her leaning over the fence staring at my dogs. Again I don’t mind, because they were huskies and they didn’t care. One of them was sort of staring at her, the almost blind one was staring up at the sun, and the other was licking himself, which is what he does most of the time. It was a little odd, because she wasn’t just looking, she was really glowering at them. But whatever, fine, eventually she leaves.

A couple of days later I am outside in the tool shed beside the fence, and I hear growling. I peer out the door, and the two dogs are playing, the one is licking a different area of himself, and the mail woman is growling at them. “Um, what are you doing?”
“Your dogs are vicious!” She yells, and runs off.

She went ahead and complained to the city about them too. The animal control officer knew my dogs, and he laughed at her.

Your story reminded me of that woman. People are odd.

8

How about getting a cheap “Keep Dogs Off Lawn” sign and putting it right at the edge of your property line. See if the irony of the fact that you have dogs actually strikes anyone.

9

How about some chemically treated lawn signs?

My dogs are big on the barking. We live on a road without sidewalks so people have to walk right by our wire fence-line. This tends to wake up the entire neighborhood doggie chorus.

And this guy is an ass. Although it’s people that walk by and taunt my kids that really tick me off. Why do they feel it necessary to “bark” at my dogs?

10

I had a golden opprotunity, and I took it.

I work in a museum, and once, I was leading a group of kids on a tour. A boy, about six years old saw a dog on a neighboring lawn, and began to taunt it. He grinned at me, and said, “I like to tease 'em.”

“That’s really dangerous,” I told him, shaking my head. “You know, if they really want to, they can unhook those leashes.”

“Really?” he whispered, wide-eyed.

“Yeah,” I said. “They have prehensile thumbs.” I wiggled mine to demonstrate. “One of these days, if you make one mad enough, he’ll reach up, unhook his leash, and come after you.”

He looked terrified, and again said, “Really?” I asked him how he would feel if he was the dog, and saw him become very pensive.

Later, on the tour, we passed by the fence again. Another little boy ran up ane began hooting at the dog. The boy I spoke to ran up to him, and began to whisper urgently. I thought I heard him say “pencil thumbs!” as I passed by.

Yeah, I lied and scared a little kid, but maybe that will keep him from tormenting any more animals, and might prevent him from getting injured in the furture.

11

We have a big bay window in the front that our dogs are allowed up in. They’ll often bark at people passing by, but recently a kid has been coming by almost daily on his bicycle and stopping and sitting outside the window until the dogs are just going insane. I’m about ready to open the door and see what he does. (The dogs are a golden retriever and lab/golden retriever mix, so they’re not exactly vicious, they just love to bark!) They’d probably just want to lick him to death, but HE wouldn’t know that…and maybe it would teach him not to tease peoples’ dogs.

Your dogwalker is an ass. You have every right to tell him to get his dog the fuck off your lawn and out of your flowerbed. And definitely take photos. Photos are your friend. :smiley: