Finally lost it with neighbours

[FinnalyCracked]

There’s four houses on the close - and none for miles (converted country barns - hence the being so close together and yet nothing for miles).

Neighbour A has three cats and all are outdoor cats. Me and Neighbour B have dogs. Neighbour C is irrelevant to this pet debacle.

Neighbours A’s cats, since they moved in, have constantly shit in everyone’s garden. Don’t come at me and tell me it’s not them as the closest village is six miles and no one else has sodding cats!! They sit on the garage and hiss at anyone who goes by and are, quite frankly, obnoxious.

I’ve bitten my tongue but neighbour Cs and B have not. Neighbour B has taken much delight in having their dogs chase the cats off. Neighbour C has invested in barbed wire and other such things to keep the cats out

Yesterday, neighbour A knocked on my door and asked me to call my dogs in as they were ‘destroying her enjoyment of her garden.’ I was very polite - but very firm - and told her to fuck off (not quite that frank, but you get the idea). I’d just finished work, so the dogs had been inside with me so they’d been out about five minutes when she appeared. She launched into a a bit of a diatribe about how B and I have been ruining her summers for years now with our dogs barking and running around.

I snapped. Said her cats constantly shit in my garden and I had to pick it up as I had small children and that her fucking hot tub was obnoxiously loud, so was their music and their shitheaps of cars (her partner always has a rotation of them that he tinkers with) all over the driveway lowered the tone and created exhaust fumes, and that if I ever saw her cats in my garden again I’d be taking a leaf out of neighbour Bs book and setting my dogs on them. Then I told her not to come onto my property again and slammed the door in her face.

It’s a first world problem, I know. But I am just so fucking sick of biting my tongue and being a good neighbour )including taking her fucking parcels) and she has the bloody gall to tell me my dogs can’t be in the garden, as their playing ‘ruins her enjoyment.’

WHAT ABOUT MY FUCKING ENJOYMENT, DEBBIE?!?!

That’s it. That’s all I wanted (just a place to rant)

You can report everyone to me if you like. 😜

It's a typical English insanity that with so much space around you, four houses are crammed next to one another They’re converted barns @PaulShears. There was no option but to have them right where they are.

You are in the right but cat lovers will see no issue in their pets pooping in your garden!

Cats have no "right" to roam - it's just that if you shoot them without a vermin shooting licence the RSPCA will report you for "cruelty".

Dogs have a right to their garden, cats have a right to shit, you have a right to keep cats out of your garden

just to explain to you, TriesNotToBeCynical,

Legal Framework
• Animals Act 1971: This Act imposes strict liability on owners for damage caused by certain animals, such as livestock and dogs. However, cats are excluded from these provisions, meaning owners are generally not held liable for their cats’ actions under this law.
• Common Law: Under common law, cats are not considered capable of trespass, and their owners are typically not liable for their roaming behavior. This legal perspective acknowledges the independent nature of cats and their tendency to wander.
• Animal Welfare Act 2006: While this Act mandates that pet owners meet their animals’ welfare needs, it does not require cats to be kept indoors or confined to their owners’ property.

Implications

As a result of these legal distinctions, cats in the UK are permitted to roam freely without their owners being held responsible for typical behaviours such as entering neighbours gardens.

What about not converting the barns at all and just building four new ones to a superior standard, drawing on hundreds of years of experience and using modern materials? The Germans, Swedish and Finnish are particularly good at this.
I have been to 25 countries and English regulations are the very worst that I have seen anywhere. It's true that our electrical installation products are good But the mindless replacement of any potential for sound judgement by regulations has long since destroyed any chance of doing anything well. Yes it's true that other countries also do things very badly but there is at least the potential to do things well. That is utterly impossible in a small island with 70 million people growing by one every one minute and twenty seconds. We have long since raced to the collective bottom and started to dig down as well as ever higher. These conflicts of interest will not be resolved by collective agreement.

Bizarre that cats would shit all over the gardens with dogs there, yet theres no houses for 6 miles.

Well I actually had a neighbour that would let their dog shit on my lawn EVERY day. I got sick of it. One day I picked it up with a shovel placed it in their mailbox. Their dog never shit on my lawn again.lol

I think to be fair to you your a mum who was tired worked all day came home and had a neighbour who you are already annoyed at over her cats (rightly so in my mind). She obviously has an issue with the dogs for a while.

Just ignore those neighbours. I would just live your life. If your dogs are in your yard and making noise running around she can't do anything. I would just put up a good screen between you two and move on.

I don't think your an ass.

Not if they don't find the body......Sorry going all dark.lol

Also I agree Cats can't just roam. No pet can.

YABVU

Barking, if it’s constant, can be considered a nuisance by law
Cats using your garden as their toilet is not against any law and nor is them wandering into your garden.
Your dog however must be kept under control by you so cannot wander
Neighbours can own cars and fiddle about with them whenever they want.
The fact that the cats hiss at you as you pass by is not a surprise
If neighbour Bs dog or yours for that matter kill a cat then they could be considered a dangerous dog, he could get ‘a record’, he could be taken away and the police will support your cat owning neighbour in getting compensation from you or neighbour B ( whoever owns the dog )
Clearly some hot tubs are loud in your opinion. If you don’t like it get the council out to check the noise levels ( good luck with that )

The best way to deal with your issues is to move somewhere with no neighbours. 6 miles in all directions maybe. Definitely not near livestock, wildlife or farmers farming.

Cats are a menace to wildlife and should be only allowed as pets if they are kept inside or walked on leads like dogs.

You're both intolerant neighbours. The end.

Yes but there’s no law about any of that.
We are dealing with reality here

This is so lovely. I feel like I need you to talk me off the ledge every now and then. 😊

Quite so, the owners can't be held responsible but that does not give cats a right over neighbours' property, there is just a limited amount that the neighbours can do about it. But they have a perfect right to use fences and dogs to keep them out and in principle killing the cats painlessly would not be a crime. Not that I am suggesting it is a good idea.

I agree.
most cats keep out of gardens with dogs. Very surprising.
Especially as they seem to be doing it a lot to be doing it ‘all over the garden’. Again cats go back to the same location. Whereas dogs will go anywhere.

You can’t go around killing cats whether painless or not

What are you talking about fgs!

Google might be your friend here 🤯

Not really, they are aggressively territorial animals and will soon learn that the neighbours are impotent against them, and will openly sneer and spit if you chase them from your garden; or turn round, show their claws, and ask what you are going to do about it. They do that to my small dog in her garden and intimidate her into (wisely) not attacking them.

Do you have a case, especially at the level of a precedent? Note the "may" in that statement.

Do you seriously think you can go around killing peoples pets!

basic google.
Can we stop promoting this crap on mumsnet

Reported that post ( and i don’t care admitting it ) because I am absolutely disgusted

We put lemon rinds through our garden when the neighbourhood cat used our garden beds as a litter tray. Apparently cats don’t like the smell. I’d heard chilli works but I didn’t want my young children touching the chillis. Rinds taken off with a peeler in long strips to hang over plants at cat head height. Very effective and just decomposes away.

I know you were probably looking for validation but I found your post self-righteous and lacking insight. Every cat in the neighbourhood comes through my garden.. so what.. I am not overrun with cat poo..
Dogs bark.. sometimes it can be real annoying.. again.. live and let live..
4 houses in a row.. sounds a very unfriendly lot.. barbed wire.. dogs set on cats, ganging up..
Good neighbours are a godsend.. especially in a rural area...you never know when you might need them...even if it's just a friendly chat on the street.

Stop building fortresses and build a community instead...
It may be possible to move forward and foster better relationships again.. I really hope you can find a peaceful way 🙏.

I pick up our neighbours cat poo from our garden regularly, there's one that makes eye contact with as as her has long luxurious shits in our garden whilst we eat our dinners! It socks but really what can the neighbours do about it?

Barking dogs are far worse though.

You sound like the awful neighbour.

Huh. We live in a very rural area. we have one cat who is elderly, and sleeps most of the time. If she poos, it is in the farm field, or unfortunately in my own veg or flower garden. Our neighbour has a cat which is well behaved, and a dog which is not…the dog chases our car when we drive home and runs erratically in front of it, it is in our garden constantly, it runs at us, barks and growls. It barks incessantly if we walk by, if we throw a piece of rubbish away etc. In addition, they have holiday lets, and let it to people with dogs. I’ve had to ask a number of times of guests not to let their dog poo in our garden…I’ve seen guests encourage their dogs through the hedge to do so, or hang the bags of poo on our hedge. Lovely.

Guess what the response was when I said…can you please not have your dog run around in our Garden and tell your guests not to let their dogs poo in our yard, around our cars, etc…yep, complaint our cat was roaming about. The neighbours opinion is the cat should be kept inside 24-7, whilst their animals should roam around freely. I had to end up saying…well, Ok, we’ll put a camera up then, and after we film your dog in our garden, we’ll call the dog warden. No problem.

Suddenly, the dog went to obedience school and no more problems for me stepping in dog poo when I went to hang the laundry on the line. it still chases our car though, and if the dog runs at me, I keep a squirt gun or hose on the ready.

Give me a cat any day of the week.