To stop throwing the balls back over the fence?

[Danielsss]

Those bloody balls. The kids next door constantly play ball games, the balls always go over our fence! We would always get a knock on the door, every 2 minutes. I ended up saying if just throw it back over, it's still as frequent!!! How do I stop this?

Oh, I can see both sides of this debate as well.

It all comes down to both parties being considerate: my boys have learnt to kick balls where the wall is the highest so the least number of balls goes over various wall. And our neighbours are nice (note the one exception) and obliviously, like us, value good neighbourly relationships. We water each others plants, keep emergency keys, take deliveries etc - it's a nice reciprocal approach that is working for us and it would appear also for the neighbours.

I suppose it comes down to what kind of relationship the OP would like to develop with her neighbours.

The ones who do it deliberately, knock constantly, key cars, etc - I can understand that being awful.

I've got two boys who love football. They have two goals in our decent sized back garden. They're not always good at controlling it, it sometimes goes over. I've bought them only foam balls so that no damage is done. I don't let them knock, they have to wait until the balls get returned. I have taken each neighbour a bottle of wine as an apology/thank you for returning balls.

Consideration works both ways. Next door has a teenager - we don't mind the odd party. One neighbour has a baby - we don't mind the crying. We don't have a big park near us, our garden is quite big. It's not me being lazy, sometimes we have things to do and can't drive off to the park.

They are polite children who don't do it deliberately - and I much prefer them to be out playing in the garden to being plonked in front of an Xbox all day. They know if they kick all 3 balls over, they are gone until the neighbours have a chance to return them in their own time. If any of our neighbours then started refusing to return or damaging the balls, then we'd have a serious problem.

I don't let my children play football in the garden, they have a trampoline, playhouse, slide etc

It's not fair on neighbours to worry about balls flying over and hitting them/their pets/children. I certainly wouldn't be in a hurry to chuck balls back over. If you've got toddlers who really must kick a ball why not get one of those ones that you can attach to the child or that comes on a rope with a peg to plug into the ground. Neighbourly relations work both ways be considerate enough not to inconvenience your neighbour with flying balls that can cause damage.

Small to mid size gardens are not football pitches/cricket fields etc

We had this today - ball kept coming over, the little scrotes threatened my 11 year old that if she didn't keep returning the ball that they would all come for her over the fence. Next time it came over they got their ball back and an earful from me.

The first time they knocked, I showed them how to open the gate and told them to get their stuff back whenever they needed to.

I don't agree with damaging the balls though
How is it that if a ball comes into your garden and you don't return it or if you damage it then you are likely to receive a visit from a PCSO about it but the fact that your garden becomes an unpleasant place to be and your pets don't want to go out there and lots of your plants have been damaged doesn't matter???

(Please don't tell me that the police don't do this because it has happened to me, more than once.)

I loathe summer holidays. NDN kids are out there constantly and it's the noise, bang, bang, bang from the balls, a really loud thumping sound. Then we get the balls flying over randomly, damaging plants, frightening dogs and making our garden not a nice relaxing place to be. The boys were clambering over the fence to gain access when we were out (leaving a trail of damaged and trampled plants), so we've put up further trellis and fencing above the existing 6ft fence.

The weird thing is that these kids have a superb open green space provided by the developers of our estate less than five yards from their front door. They could play there safely and happily all day.

The constant noise and disturbance has genuinely affected our quality of life and if we could afford it, we'd move tomorrow.

What a lot of meanies. My NDN boys kick/throw/hurl balls, nerd pellets, frisbees and other random stuff over the fence all the time. I really don't mind. I usually go out at the end the day and chuck them back. If they are in their garden they shout out a polite thank you. They are doing what little kids are meant to be doing. They are playing outside and having fun.

The parents thank me when they see me too.

Occasionally they come around to ask for a particular ball that they would like returned immediately but as they are really polite I genuinely don't mind.

A really sweet little boy (who is around 7) knocked on my door with his dad, he asked if it was okay for him to collect his ball that had gone down the side of our house (he didn't even need to knock as it hadn't gone over our fence it was just right down the side bless him and his dad, who were very grateful. I didn't mind one bit.

Maybe you didn't notice the OP saying she has no gate, Francis?

Of course you can nail slats into a fence. Or into the fence posts. Or you could provide a ladder. Or a gate. Or just unclench and throw the balls back when you see them coming in. (Nonetcurtains, these children are just children. There is no suggestion they have ever keyed cars or anything else you were subjected to).

Getting one's knickers in a twist is a waste of time and energy and there is a simple solution that can work out well for all concerned - letting them retrieve their own balls, using whatever means possible.

Clearly the children here like playing ball. Clearly they are going to keep on knocking on the door if they can't retrieve their own balls. Clearly you have to choose some practical solution. You are probably not going to stop the ball playing, so I recommend you rule that out and focus on what is doable.

PovertyPain Fri 26-Aug-16 09:35:32
Good example of parents being to lazy to take their children to their local park, so just throw them out into the garden, because THEY want peace and quiet. Entitled parents expecting the world to revolve around their little darlings

The parents are presumably the owners of their own garden, yet they must not allow their children to play there?

To allow their own children to play in their own garden that they own and pay for is entitlement?
It is lazy?

Blimey.

Sometimes I read threads here on Mumsnet (a parenting site, no less) and I think, 'Holy cow, there really are people in this world who actually hate children'.

Or is it that we have airs?
Do we think we are entitled to the fantasy that we live in an ancestral pile on secluded grounds somewhere in leafy Norfolk and all the children on our three-bed-semi estate must indulge us?

PersianCatLady, because a ball is someone else's property, 'unpleasant' is in the eye of the beholder, and plants grow back. Plus the police only have your word for it that your pets don't want to go out in the garden - they can't ask the pets.

You can't damage a ball any more than you can key a car that is blocking your drive, or flatten its tyres.

I've never had a fence that was suitable to be converted into a ladder, even if for some utterly mad reason I would want to do that! The occasional ball is fine, but when you know they are doing it deliberately, then that is a different matter. The ball from next door gets retrieved as and when I can be arsed, which might be on the same day, or might be a few days later, depending on how tired I am. NDN's child is perfectly accepting of that and is always polite in asking for the ball back if they see me. I did warn said child one day that if the ball came over again then they would not be getting it back that day. I was pegging out the washing and I think they thought I was just out there to throw the ball backwards and forwards over the fence. the mother heard me and the child was told in no uncertain terms that she was not to do it again. Incidences of the ball coming over have lessened and thankfully they are back in school now.

Math anxiety, plants don't just grow back and they are also property. Permanently placed on someone's land. And no, it's not on to damage someone's property because it's inconvenient or too far away to go to the park and your little one will not get any exercise unless they kick a ball repeatedly in your small garden.

I love lively children having a good healthy time (I had four myself). I don't like cheeky little feckers who think I am a dog to play fetch with. The little squirts darlings who used to enjoy punting their ball into my garden didn't live next door; most of them didn't live in the same street. Their parents would turf them out at the crack of dawn and they'd wander up our way and kick balls against the side wall, the front window (argh!) and very frequently into the back garden. I did return them a few times but eventually adopted the method a pp used of saying I would only give the ball back if an adult asked for it. The bloody thing sat in my garden for a week. I then chucked it out and it sat in the side alley for another couple of days, until someone else ran over it. Clearly they really needed that ball.

Mean? Sue me. If they're being a bit noisy that's fine. If a stray ball sometimes comes over and they want it back, also fine. But there are limits. I seem tough and assertive, I came over as angry, but I was really rather upset. I had depression and anxiety at the time, and the sound of heavy things thumping on my front window (often after dark) absolutely terrified me. Some of the horrible neighbours mentioned on this thread may have similar problems. Do you really know? (I appreciate that some of them may just be miserable bastards. There's plenty of that around.)

Children are the citizens of tomorrow. Failing to teach them a bit of consideration for their fellow beings is doing them no favours in the long term. Yes, people do live in groups. That's why there are rules about communal behaviour. There is a happy medium between children being seen and not heard, and the buggers running riot.

OP - i think you would be totally reasonable to tell them that you will collect them up and pop them back over at the end of the day. You don't expect to be disturbed every time a ball comes over.

I work from home - I couldn't possibly spend all day jumping up to retrieve footballs or indeed watching for them to come over.

You don't have to find slats of wood lying around . There are lumber yards nowadays where they sell wood. They also sell ladders at most home improvement places.

Plants do in fact grow back. I grew up in a house with a garden in which grew pear, apple, and plum trees (espalier style for the plums), black, red and white currant bushes, gooseberry bushes, roses, gladioli, opium poppies, lilies, rhubarb, raspberries, alpine strawberries, cabbages, onions, chives, new potatoes, lettuce, spinach, purple sprouting broccoli, asparagus, carrots, parsley, rosemary and kale, that was surrounded by no less than seven other gardens (weird layout) and I have a garden myself. Most plants will stand a lot of wear and tear. And most children will do as asked when it comes to any plants you are especially worried about. These children are being polite and knocking, so there is no reason to suppose they would behave like wildebeests.

Dogs otoh are often a positive nuisance in gardens due to their propensity to dig..

You cannot damage a ball for the reasons I have stated. You cannot key a car either, for the same reasons. Plants are in a different category of property. You might as well complain about your neighbours smoking upwind of you and making you cough as you sit out doing your crossword as complain about balls coming over a fence and damaging plants. Or complain about grass being trampled on.

www.citizensadvice.org.uk/housing/problems-where-you-live/neighbour-disputes/
'Damage done by children
If a neighbour’s child causes damage to a property, a conciliatory approach to settle the matter is probably the best solution. Legally, the child can be sued for damages if they are old enough to know what they were doing. In practice, this is unrealistic since few courts would look favourably on such an action, and a child is unlikely to have much money to pay any damages. However, the parents of the child may be liable for negligence and damages if they have trusted the child with something dangerous that was beyond their capability to use responsibly, for example, an air gun. The parents may also be liable if they have failed to exercise the control that would be expected of a parent given the child’s age.
Balls and ball games
If a child throws a ball into a neighbour’s property, the neighbour should either hand it back or allow it to be collected. However, as it is a trespass for the ball to cross the neighbour’s boundary, even if it was unintentional, the neighbour would be entitled to financial compensation if any damage has been caused.'

In other words, suck it up.
We are not talking about plants here, but greenhouse or conservatory glass or shattered gnomes.

And no, it's not on to damage someone's property because it's inconvenient or too far away to go to the park and your little one will not get any exercise unless they kick a ball repeatedly in your small garden.
Actually, they are entitled to fair use of their own garden, and outrageous though that may sound to many here that includes kicking a ball daily for hours on end.

I would also like to take this opportunity to point out that these children have not in fact damaged anyone's property, nor have they thrown the ball over deliberately, or cursed, or flung beer bottles or any other anti-social behaviour.

They are guilty of the hanging offence of ringing a doorbell to ask politely for their ball when it goes over.

And to those of you using the possessive pronoun to describe the fences around your gardens, you might want to check if they are actually yours to be all possessive about.

As I said before she is also free to come through herself and get it. Her mother likes her to ask first, which agree is polite.

Well there you have it.
The OP needs to get a gate.
Or she needs to accept that knocking is done out of politeness.

They knock every 2 minutes, that really isn't polite.

I think I might know if my fences are my own mathanxiety. And I still can't comprehend why you would even think of making your fence into a ladder for the neighbour's kids. Could I see pictures of your fence that you have transformed in this manner? I would be interested to see what kind of fence you have.

As for the child not getting the ball back instantly - well do you know what? I actually have a life and it doesn't involve waiting around in the garden all day to throw a ball back over my fence! Perhaps you have nothing better to do, but I do.

I think telling the kids you'll throw the ball back when you have time is reasonable. Every 2 minutes is ridiculous.