# What may I do with someone's property on my land? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 26, 2005, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926 "2005-06-26T16:23:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2005, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926/41 "2005-06-27T20:19:10Z")
> [@Unregistered Bull](#): > > Cool. I think that I’ve just found the perfect place to park, throw away my garbage, and let my dog shit at. DrDeth’s front yard. Don’t even think of throwing any of it way, especially the dog shit and the garbage. You don’t have any right to throw it away. Could you choose my yard instead? I relish the chance to sue you for harassment, thereby taking advantage of my **legal** recourse against your actions :). Daniel ---
**Author:** ![Contrapuntal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e274bd/32.png) [@Contrapuntal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Contrapuntal)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2005, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926/42 "2005-06-27T20:19:43Z")
**Lefty,** Let me present a more specific scenario, if that is not violating the spirit of the OP. You are a parent who homeschools two small children. At times during the day your children play outside. You also tend a large garden to help feed your family. In your neighborhood there is a colony of feral cats, as well as many cats that are allowed to run free by their owners. None of the cats wear collars. Through interaction with your neighbors you come to realize that their views concerning vet visits and vaccinations and such are much more lax than yours. You constantly find cat feces in the kid’s playbox. New plantings and seedlings are often befouled by feces and urine. Your neighbors make no attempt to restrain their cats. You have trapped cats and shooed them off with a hose 'till you are blue in the face. What is the most extreme action you would take to insure your family’s well-being? Is it all possible that any of the cats I have described could be considered pests? ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2005, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926/43 "2005-06-27T20:31:28Z")
> [@Contrapuntal](#): > > What is the most extreme action you would take to insure your family’s well-being? > > Is it all possible that any of the cats I have described could be considered pests? This is a fine example; I’m interested in exploring what I call “borderline” issues. For this example, I’ll assume again that your community has no laws against killing unowned cats: such laws would almost certainly be anti-cruelty laws, and I said I want to set such laws aside for these examples. That said, I’m not sure what the answer to your first question is. It’s a great borderline: what measures must you take to determine whether an item of property is owned, given that if it is owned, it is probably valued by the owner? It’s an excellent question. According to your second question, I’d say yes: the way you’ve phrased it, they’re all pests. The problem is that the word “pest” has no legal meaning (or if it does in your jurisdiction, we need to see the word’s legal definition before we determine whether these cats are pests). But if they’re not owned, then certainly you’d not be violating property rights by poisoning them, setting them on fire, or feeding them live to your rottweiler. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![Contrapuntal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e274bd/32.png) [@Contrapuntal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Contrapuntal)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2005, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926/44 "2005-06-27T20:36:19Z")
The problem I was trying to set up is _how can you tell if they are owned?_ The feral cats are identical to the owned cats. ---
**Author:** ![Contrapuntal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e274bd/32.png) [@Contrapuntal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Contrapuntal)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2005, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926/45 "2005-06-27T20:38:16Z")
Sorry. I see now that you addresed that. Carry on. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2005, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926/46 "2005-06-27T20:45:18Z")
One fairly extreme option you could take (that may not be the most extreme) would be to notify your neighbors by mail (preferably certified, return receipt) that you’re going to start trapping cats and, if they’re not wearing a collar, kill them. (Again, stipulating the lack of animal cruelty laws in your jurisdiction). This also assumes that your area has leash laws. In such a case, you’d have made a good-faith effort to identify any cat as owned once it’s trapped on your land. You’d be checking a cat’s owned status BEFORE killing it. You still might get in trouble with your neighbors: if someone’s cat got out of the house, for example, and you killed it before they could capture it, they might bring a suit against you and have a chance of winning under **Gfactor’s** theory. I dunno. The safest thing to do would be to get animal control to come out and set some mass traps for the colony: this would minimize your risk of legal exposure, although it might increase the health risk for you. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2005, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926/47 "2005-06-27T21:18:52Z")
> [@Unregistered Bull](#): > > Cool. I think that I’ve just found the perfect place to park, throw away my garbage, and let my dog shit at. DrDeth’s front yard. Don’t even think of throwing any of it way, especially the dog shit and the garbage. You don’t have any right to throw it away. You are equating a living family pet, to a pile of shit? :rolleyes: However, I would \*ask \*you not to. Then, if you didn’t concur- then I’d call the police on you. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2005, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926/48 "2005-06-27T21:26:38Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > You are equating a living family pet, to a pile of shit? As near as I can tell, he gives them exactly the same value. However, the value the **landowner** places on the item of property is irrelevant, I believe: it’s the value the **item’s owner** places on the item that pertains. More specifically, it’s the value that a **reasonable person** believes the item owner might place on it that pertains. No reasonable person believes that **Unregistered Bull** places a high value on dogshit, and so if he turns out to be a lunatic who highly values the dogshit he leaves in your yard, nobody is going to penalize you for disposing of it properly. However, even if you’re a save-the-earth nut who believes that cars are valueless menaces to society, a reasonable person does not believe that **Unregistered Bull** places no value on his car. If you therefore destroy his car, you will be liable for doing so. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2005, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926/49 "2005-06-27T21:36:12Z")
> [@Left Hand of Dorkness](#): > > If a child drops her bicycle in your yard, **may you destroy it** as you would (legally) be able to destroy a cat? The bicycle or the child? If the neighbor’s child wanders onto your land, there are limits to what you may do to the child, regardless of the fact that he/she is on your property. Wouldn’t the same be true, if not to the same extent, of pets? ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2005, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926/50 "2005-06-27T21:40:13Z")
> [@Thudlow Boink](#): > > The bicycle or the child? 😃 The bicycle, of course. I don’t think anyone argues that you should be allowed to kack the kid. > [@](#): > > If the neighbor’s child wanders onto your land, there are limits to what you may do to the child, regardless of the fact that he/she is on your property. Wouldn’t the same be true, if not to the same extent, of pets? I suspect so, but remember, I’m wanting to set animal cruelty laws aside now, and focus solely on whether property laws limit what you may do. That’s why I’m comparing cases of **property** left on someone else’s land instead of on cases of **humans** trespassing on someone else’s land. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 12:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926/51 "2005-06-28T00:01:25Z")
> [@Left Hand of Dorkness](#): > > That’s why I’m comparing cases of **property** left on someone else’s land instead of on cases of **humans** trespassing on someone else’s land. > > Daniel Yes but they overlap. Some seem to think that you may do anything you want to dudes who trespass. In other words, you can hide in your bushes with a shotgun, and the instant anyone toes move an inch onto your property line-\*\* BLAMMO\*\*. :dubious: :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926/52 "2005-06-28T00:18:00Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Yes but they overlap. Some seem to think that you may do anything you want to dudes who trespass. In other words, you can hide in your bushes with a shotgun, and the instant anyone toes move an inch onto your property line-\*\* BLAMMO\*\*. :dubious: :rolleyes: I’m willing to consider those folks outliers :). As is probably obvious to most folks, I strongly suspect that even if animal cruelty laws did not exist, it would be illegal under most circumstances to poison your neighbor’s cat should it stray onto your land, just as it would be illegal to appropriate their car should it end up on your land. I started this thread to see if anyone could give support (or tear down) this argument. **Gfactor** has given tentative support to it, and I’ve not seen anyone give anything like a substantive counterargument (although **Northern Piper** did raise an interesting point). As for ethical concerns, there are some folks who take what seem to me to be extremist positions on the matter, but they’re in the distinct minority, and even some of them acknowledge that what may be ethically defensible is also morally impermissible. Bringing animal cruelty laws into the equation now: It seems to me that there is a justification for animal cruelty laws that does not rely on animal rights (and indeed, such laws make no sense from an animal rights perspective: why on earth would an AR advocate distinguish between a family cat, an unowned housecat, a gopher, and a beef-cow?). Namely, domesticated animals are almost unique among property in that a significant propoertion of owners place a very strong value on their pet’s well-being that is far out of proportion to the pet’s fair market value. The only other common property that shares this feature is stuff like wedding photographs, and wedding photographs very rarely end up in other people’s yards. Normally the law can use fair market value as a determinant of the seriousness of a crime of destruction of property: if I smash your $10 garden gnome, I’m going to get in less trouble with the law than if I smash your $100,000 sports car. It’s a rough judge of how much the individual values their possessions. But this method of valuation breaks down when pets are concerned. Animal protection laws help us accurately reflect the value folks place in their companion animals. Now, this doesn’t account for all laws: there’s a cat at our shelter right now whose owner will face jail time if we find her, because she left her cat in an apartment without food or water for two weeks. THat’s not an extension of property law. But even if we were operating from a pure property-rights perspective and considered such cruelty to be legal, we’d still need some sort of laws specifically dealing with animal companions to reflect the unusual way that people value them. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![Pazu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pazu/32/15522_2.png) [@Pazu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pazu)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 5:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926/53 "2005-06-28T05:02:00Z")
Another factor that should be considered in your set of three scenarios is the distinction between claimed and unclaimed property. To wit: 1. If there’s a kite left in our yard, is the onus on me to figure out which of the possible neighbors it could belong to? My feeling is, if someone doesn’t attempt to claim it in a certain period of time, I don’t have to feel guilty about disposing of it as I see fit. 2. Same with the car. If I _know_ who it belongs to, I ask them to move it. If there’s no indication of ownership, and someone doesn’t come to claim it promptly, it gets towed. 3. For that matter, same with the cats. Unfortunately, cats are a more difficult problem in that they don’t stay where they’re left, and generally you only know they’ve been through your yard due to the evidence they’ve left behind. In my case, there are at least four local cats who regularly wander through our yard, but the only one I’ve caught _in flagrante_ was our next-door neighbor’s elderly beast who seemed to think our lawn was a shit repository. I don’t know if he’s the same one that craps in our flowerbeds or killed the little alligator lizards that inhabited our front yard; I suspect the other vagrants were contributors as well. But how do I figure out who (if anyone) to talk to about keeping their pets out of our yard? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Highwayman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7993a0/32.png) [@The\_Highwayman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Highwayman)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926/54 "2005-06-28T05:54:58Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > I’d apply the Golden Rule: what would I want someone to do if I had committed these transgressions? > > 1- Knock on door. Ask if this is their kite. If they say yes, give it to them. If not, either throw away or use if you happen to like kites. > > 2- Knock on door. Ask if they would kindly move their car which was parked in your spot. If they do, say thank you. If not, call police to have it towed. > > 3- Knock on door. Ask if they are aware of local ordinances about cats being let outdoors. If cat comes around again, squirt it with a garden hose. Won’t hurt the cat, and it will soon learn to not come around anymore. > > Key phrases: Knock on door. Ask. Real nice Bob, I completely agree with you. But some people want an excuse to kill animals. Squirting the cat is not enough, the poor kitty has to die! **Sounds to me like some people have a deep-seated fear of pussy.** ---
**Author:** ![Contrapuntal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e274bd/32.png) [@Contrapuntal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Contrapuntal)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926/55 "2005-06-28T14:30:50Z")
> [@The Highwayman](#): > > Real nice Bob, I completely agree with you. But some people want an excuse to kill animals. Squirting the cat is not enough, the poor kitty has to die! > > **Sounds to me like some people have a deep-seated fear of pussy.** If squirting the kitty were an effective solution to the problem I doubt anyone would prefer to kill it. It simply isn’t, and it is disingenuous to suggest otherwise. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926/56 "2005-06-28T15:15:48Z")
> [@Pazu](#): > > Another factor that should be considered in your set of three scenarios is the distinction between claimed and unclaimed property. To wit: > > 1. If there’s a kite left in our yard, is the onus on me to figure out which of the possible neighbors it could belong to? My feeling is, if someone doesn’t attempt to claim it in a certain period of time, I don’t have to feel guilty about disposing of it as I see fit. > > 2. Same with the car. If I _know_ who it belongs to, I ask them to move it. If there’s no indication of ownership, and someone doesn’t come to claim it promptly, it gets towed. > … > But how do I figure out who (if anyone) to talk to about keeping their pets out of our yard? It seems to me that you’ve set up a pretty good pattern: 1. If the object is something you can easily store, then you store it and wait for someone to claim it. If they don’t claim it within a reasonable period of time, don’t feel bad about disposing of it (assuming no other laws apply). 2. If the object is something that you can’t easily store, find out if there’s a way for you to have it removed from your property by a storage agency. It then becomes their problem, and they presumably have a “reasonable period of time” set up for folks. It seems to me that both the car and the cat fall under the second heading. It’s not your responsibility to find out whose cat it is that’s coming onto your property: if you trap the cat and surrender it to your local animal control agency, then you’ve acted properly and transferred the unclaimed property to the “storage agency” which will hold it for the owner to come claim. The fact that cats are difficult to catch in the act is a very fair point, and is a difference between cars and cats: if someone leaves their car on your land, you’ll know it, but if someone lets their cat wander onto your land, the cat will likely be gone by the time you discover the trespass. Does this change the property responsibilities? I’m not sure that it does. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![mrrealtime](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e8c25b/32.png) [@mrrealtime](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mrrealtime)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926/57 "2005-06-28T15:35:56Z")
Shakespeares “Merchant of Venice” deals with this question quite well I think, or better yet “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you”. ---
**Author:** ![Pazu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pazu/32/15522_2.png) [@Pazu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pazu)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926/58 "2005-06-28T15:52:49Z")
> [@Left Hand of Dorkness](#): > > It seems to me that you’ve set up a pretty good pattern: > > 1. If the object is something you can easily store, then you store it and wait for someone to claim it. If they don’t claim it within a reasonable period of time, don’t feel bad about disposing of it (assuming no other laws apply). > 2. If the object is something that you can’t easily store, find out if there’s a way for you to have it removed from your property by a storage agency. It then becomes their problem, and they presumably have a “reasonable period of time” set up for folks. > > \ Of course, a difficult issue in my scenario is: who defines what constitutes a reasonable length of time? My principle is basic enough (if someone doesn’t care enough about their property to claim it, why should I care about it enough to store/maintain it?), but different folks might have differing ideas about the appropriate interval of time required to make that decision. And, of course, you run into issues like “But I was gone on vacation for two weeks! How could you have tossed that kite/towed my car/trapped my cat?” Of course, from my angle, the appropriate time interval is probably inversely proportional to the amount of effort required to store or maintain said object. 🙂 But this actually raises another question: assuming we agree on a stated “waiting period”, should the object _cease_ to be considered someone else’s possession? I suppose that if I feel I can dispose of it, I’ve already made that _de facto_ assumption, but it then changes the ethical landscape a bit. For instance: 1. No one comes around asking about the kite for a couple of months. I decide that the wooden dowels comprising its frame could be better used in some project I’m building, so I disassemble the kite and cannibalize its components. Reasonable? 2. No one claims the car (and it’s not blocking my driveway or something) for a few weeks (say I haven’t bothered to call a tow for some reason). I decide I’d like to learn how to do more home auto maintenance, so I practice dismantling various parts of the car. Any objections? 3. I trap a cat (uncollared) and decide to keep it in my garage for a while to see if someone comes looking for it. I don’t hear anything for a few weeks (no “Missing Pet” posters around, etc.). Should the cat now be considered mine to do with as I see fit? ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926/59 "2005-06-28T15:58:44Z")
> [@Pazu](#): > > 1. No one claims the car (and it’s not blocking my driveway or something) for a few weeks (say I haven’t bothered to call a tow for some reason). I decide I’d like to learn how to do more home auto maintenance, so I practice dismantling various parts of the car. Any objections? > > 2. I trap a cat (uncollared) and decide to keep it in my garage for a while to see if someone comes looking for it. I don’t hear anything for a few weeks (no “Missing Pet” posters around, etc.). Should the cat now be considered mine to do with as I see fit? I think in both these cases, your legal options are limited: 2) While I could be wrong, I believe that you’d be required to report the car to the police before you’d be allowed to take possession of it. 3) With the cat, I believe you’re required to report it as found to local animal control before you’d be allowed to take possession of it. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![Pazu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pazu/32/15522_2.png) [@Pazu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pazu)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2005, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926/60 "2005-06-28T22:14:58Z")
> [@Left Hand of Dorkness](#): > > I think in both these cases, your legal options are limited: > 2) While I could be wrong, I believe that you’d be required to report the car to the police before you’d be allowed to take possession of it. > 3) With the cat, I believe you’re required to report it as found to local animal control before you’d be allowed to take possession of it. Hmm, interesting. I wonder where the boundary lies regarding “reportable” vs. “non-reportable” possessions. If, instead of trapping a wandering, uncollared cat, I instead take it into my home, feed it, take care of it (i.e. adopt it), and just keep it from wandering any more, am I still required to report it to local animal control? If an unclaimed car on my property can’t be dismantled (by me) without reporting it first, what about an unclaimed motorcycle? Bicycle? Refrigerator? Radio? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-may-i-do-with-someones-property-on-my-land/309926.md?page=4)