Annoying critters
I generally share this sentiment seen at LeanLeft:
Generally speaking, I think it is fair to say that I am a friend to the creatures of the earth when I am not busy eating them or wearing them.
Though I would add that I also like when they warm my ass on the heated leather seats in the truck and when I get cozy on my leather couch, love seat and recliner. I am otherwise animal friendly. But there’s not a day that goes by where I don’t contemplate taking out one of my neighbor’s dogs. Not that I would ever act on that, of course. They have three dogs and two of them are not very well-behaved. Those two are a couple of large Labradors. They have dug holes under my fence, which is adjacent to their fence. They have destroyed several pickets on my fence. One day, the got in our yard when I wasn’t home and made their merry way through our dog door. Our neighbor, being the mindful person he is, took care of those issues by putting a small electric fence at the base of his wooden fence. No problems since.
But the latest is the constant barking. All day long. They’re not barking at anything in particular, rather they just sit in the yard staring at each other and barking. And when I go into my backyard to let Junior play on the swing set, slide, monkey bars, sand box, rock wall contraption, they bark at us constantly. I’ve taken to leaving the hose in the backyard on and, when they commence barking, I give them a good soak. They even bark at Politically Incorrect Dog, who has the sense to ignore them.
They’re also quite nefarious about it. See, when my neighbor is home, they don’t bark because they know he (being the mindful sort he is) will stop them. But when he leaves for work, they start. I’m at a loss. I figure the hose beats calling animal control. Sure, the hose may annoy my neighbor if he sees me do it but calling animal control would really strain the neighbor relationship. He’s a good guy and I wouldn’t do that, just like I wouldn’t actually take his dogs out no matter how much they interfere with my enjoyment of my property.
March 22nd, 2006 at 1:43 pm
Labs bark. They just do.
I’ve had some trouble with my dogs barking. When in the house, they almost never do, but when people walk by they tend to bark at them (which I think is generally a good thing), and they often bark through the fence at the neighbor’s dog (who starts it). We’ve taken to avoiding putting them in the yard when the neighbor’s dog is in the yard. This spring, I plan on doing some landscaping that will add a buffer between them and the neighbor’s fence.
March 22nd, 2006 at 1:45 pm
I know dogs bark but it’s usually for a reason. These dogs seem to bark for no reason whatsoever and it rarely stops.
March 23rd, 2006 at 3:12 pm
Shock collar. A little barking and no problem. If they keep it up they get shocked. Some collars have a progressive system so that if the dog keeps it up the shock severity is increased.
I use these on my dogs and while it does not eliminate barking, it definitely stops the continuous barking that annoys the neighbors. The dogs don’t even mine when the collors are put on; I think they don’t associate the collar with the shock — they only gt shocked if the bark too much and most of the time the collar is just a small weight on their neck.
When the dogs were only a few months old one of them had a habit of standing on his hind legs and putting his paws on the counter to see if there was anything interesting up there. Repeated commands to stay down were only effective for about two minutes. Enter remote control shock collar; after wearing it for a few days with no shocks being given, I started give him a level one shock every time his paws touched the counter (I did not say anything or make any motions that he could see). He would get down and check out the floor, as if wondering what the hell was going on. Two days of this and he just quit putting his feet on the counter; that was three years ago. He still will stand on his hind legs to get a view of the counter but he keeps his paws well clear — he has some amazing balance on two legs.
March 23rd, 2006 at 3:13 pm
Bob, not sure my neighbors would appreciate me putting shock collars on their dogs 😉
March 24th, 2006 at 1:31 am
Probably not, but they might be receptive to the idea. You know, being a good neighbor and all that. They might be tired of listening to the dogs too and the collars do work pretty good.
March 24th, 2006 at 5:34 am
We live along a road that acts as a divider between a town and the unincorporated county – we’re on the county side. The neighborhood across from us borders a small park, and at least two of the owners there have dogs that are out all day and all night. And bark all day and all night. One is large and loud, one is small and shrill. It’s an affluent “gated community” (not that we’re on the wrong side of the tracks, but I can’t afford their taxes, let alone their home prices), and their police will not bother anyone in that neighborhood. Not even when the high school graduation party went way beyond curfew and the hired dj used the “f” word every third word. My Golden only barks at lions and tigers and bears – and the coyotes that’ve moved into the park.