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If you have a dog, it is your responsibility to keep it under control and keep it out of places where it doesn’t belong.
What would you do if your neighbor had an aggressive dog that had caused problems in the past, but now that your dogs have gotten out a few times and onto the neighbor’s property, they are complaining?
That is the situation that the person in this story is in, and he doesn’t know what to do. He feels like the neighbor’s dogs have caused issues far more times than his own, but he also doesn’t want to cause the neighbors to be even more upset.
Personally, I think he needs to focus on making sure his own dogs are properly behaved. If the neighbors’ dogs cause more trouble, he can call animal control. Read through the full story below and see what you think about it.
Dogs and Neighbors
I’ve lived in the country for 18 years in an 1870s farmhouse.
Here is a description of his property and neighbors.
My neighbors are an older couple who bought the rest of the property from the retired farmer who owned and worked it until his retirement.
They built a house in the back 40, burned down the barn behind my house on the front 40, and extended the barn driveway to their house.
Things started off so well.
Their driveway runs directly along my property line next to my master bedroom. At the time, the local excavation guy tried to get them to put the driveway down the center of the road frontage so they weren’t on top of my house. It was like that when I bought it, so I can’t complain too much.
We initially had a very good relationship. At one point, I considered them almost like adopted parents. Unfortunately, things began to deteriorate because of their German Shepherds.
The neighbors need to keep their dog off of his land.
Their first dog was aggressive toward my Lab and eventually killed a farm kitten I had recently brought home. I later learned that the neighbor’s wife would sometimes walk the dog off-leash when she knew I was at work and the dog would roam around my house.
After my Lab died, I got another dog. Their German Shepherd continued to be extremely aggressive toward her. Eventually they had to put that dog down due to illness.
It is past time to call animal control.
A few months later, they got another German Shepherd that had already been returned to the breeder multiple times because of behavioral problems. Although it completed obedience training, it remained aggressive toward other dogs and eventually attacked mine several times.
The encounters were always one-sided, with their dog going for my dog’s throat while mine was submissive. There were also occasions when the dog snapped at me. It gave my dog puncture wounds multiple times.
Some people are just terrible dog owners.
Eventually they began leashing their dog before reaching my yard, which helped, but they tended to minimize the incidents as simply “dogs being dogs.” Over the years, I became so uncomfortable that I would check their driveway before letting my dog outside.
Later, I temporarily took in a chocolate lab belonging to a friend’s deceased brother. He eventually became permanent and got along wonderfully with my other dog.
Some dogs just hate other dogs.
I thought having him around would actually make my other dog safer from coyotes or the neighbor’s German Shepherd. Unfortunately, whenever I tried to introduce the dogs, their German Shepherd became extremely aggressive.
There were also disagreements about my dogs being kept in a chain-link kennel during the day while I was at work.
These things are very valid reasons for the neighbor to complain.
Those same neighbors frequently complained that the chocolate Lab was barking and suggested he might be thirsty or need more shade, even though he always had plenty of fresh water and one end of the kennel was shaded and was simply a dog that liked lying in the sun. I eventually let them indoors because I was sick of the side talk.
On another occasion, I accidentally let the dogs out without seeing the neighbors walking their dog. The chocolate Lab ran toward them wanting to play, and the neighbor’s wife became extremely angry with me, cussing me out to no end.
Honestly, the neighbor isn’t entirely wrong.
A year later, the chocolate Lab again ran up their driveway after seeing their dog and he did a few circles around them. I immediately called him back, and he returned, but the neighbor was furious.
During that conversation, he told me it was essentially acceptable for his dog to attack mine in the past because the attacks generally happened on his side of the property line.
Once again, this guy is not keeping his dogs on his own property.
I haven’t spoken to them much in the last two years. Today, however, I had my dogs inside most of the morning while waiting for a contractor.
When I finally let them outside, I forgot to put their perimeter collars on. Within seconds, I heard screaming.
Now it is time for the neighbor to call animal control.
I ran outside and found both of my dogs across the street with my neighbor who was walking on the road, her German Shepherd, and another woman who had stopped to help.
My dogs were excited and appeared to be trying to play with the German Shepherd. My neighbor had become tangled in the leash and was on the ground.
He is really downplaying the problems his dogs create.
I separated the dogs and helped untangle her. The weird thing was her Sheperd seemed to be wanting to play too. No hackles, no growling, no teeth. Saying she was mad is an understatement.
I recognize that my dogs should not have gotten loose, and I’m planning to go back to using the kennel whenever they’re outside. However, I’m struggling with how to deal with a neighbor who is extremely upset about this incident despite the long history of her own dogs being aggressive toward my dogs.
These are entirely separate issues.
There are other longstanding frustrations as well. They and their delivery drivers drive very quickly down their long gravel driveway, sometimes around 45 mph, which creates significant dust inside my house when the windows are open and the wind is blowing the right way.
I’ve also lent her husband tools that were damaged, helped him with projects, and even prevented him from potentially seriously injuring or killing himself while cutting down a large maple tree that was actually two of them growing together.
He should deal with these complaints directly with the neighbors.
On another occasion, we agreed to split some firewood when I cut down a tree for another neighbor and the husband came over to help. It was late when we finished and we agreed to move the wood the following weekend, one week day (he was retired) he took the good pieces and left the poorly cut and twisted limb wood in my driveway.
They also complain about one of my tree’s adjacent to their driveway. The one they put in next to the tree.
Two wrongs don’t make a right, as they say.
At this point, I’m trying to figure out how to handle the relationship going forward without making things worse. I don’t want ongoing conflict, but I can’t seem to make them happy.
Their expectations are one sided. I probably had 100’s of incidents with their dogs in my first 14 years here. Now after 3 incidents with my chocolate lab in 4 years they are losing their minds.
He needs to stop downplaying the problems that his dogs are causing, even if they are smaller than the issues the neighbor’s dogs caused.
Read on to see what the people in the comments have to say about this situation.
This commenter is exactly right.
There have been too many dog incidents to ignore it.
Cameras and documentation is an important step.
Putting up a fence is a great idea.
If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about annoying neighbors who end up regretting their request for a property survey.
Dog owners are liable for their dogs.
Everyone involved needs to get their dogs trained and under control. Their conflicts aside, this is a dangerous situation for the dogs and the humans, not to mention anyone who happens to be in the area.
Unfortunately, most dog owners have little real control over their dogs, which seems to be the case here.