Neighbour on holiday - dog problem!

[loveacupoftea18]

Need advice as DH and I can't decide if we are too caught up in the problem to be objective!! Sorry if it's long, trying not to drip feed!

Live in a quiet cul-de-sac and get along with all neighbours. Our directly next-door neighbour has two enormous dogs who she loves dearly and is very good to. They do bark in the day when left alone in the garden but she is back regularly to let them out and take them for walks.

She is on the trip of a lifetime for two weeks and has a sort of friend staying in her house looking after them, with a dog walker dropping in to do the occasional dog walk.

She's been gone for 3 days. We haven't seen the friend that's staying there since Friday (however we have not been at home every minute) and the dogs are in the garden with the back door to the house wide open, all the time. They are doing absolutely nothing but barking constantly, I cannot describe just how much or how loud. It goes on for hours and hours at a time.

I don't know how regularly they are being checked on (or fed or walked!) and it first irked us when it was impossible to put our DD to bed because of the noise of the dogs barking. Banged on the front door repeatedly however no one in and ended up going around the back of the field to lean over the fence and comfort the dogs. This did cease the barking for an hour but then they're back to it. It's damn annoying but we end up feeling desperately sorry for the poor dogs and don't know what on earth to do.

They've barked every hour that we've been home today. There's still no sign of anyone in the house with them. I've just been to lean over the back fence for 15 minutes to give them a stroke and to quieten them down so DD can fall asleep.

AIBU? Surely this is not ok? What the hell can I do about it?

@DuchessDarty frequently in garden since Friday, barking for 5/6/7 hours at a time.

Haven't seen dog walker now since Friday.

I had a word with sitter this morning, there seems to have been slight improvement but even if there is a miraculous improvement, I'll still be telling my neighbour.

Neighbour has not replied to me. Not sure on WiFi / signal situation,

How long have you / your neighbour lived there OP? Do you know what she's done previously about dog care when she was on holiday?

Asking because I wondered if her normal dog care had fallen through. We have a lovely kennels that our dog goes to when he can't come with us (yes it is lovely- definitely not a prison!). Anyway we had dog booked in a couple of weeks ago and we got a phone call a couple of days before saying that there were two dogs recently been at the kennels thought to have kennel cough.

Under these circumstances we changed our arrangements and asked a friend of DS to house sit for us - not something we would have done normally. WAs wondering if something similar had happened for OP's neighbour.

Not that this helps OP or the two dogs but would explain why the neighbour would go away for 2 weeks with less than perfect care plan in place.

If you have the neighbour on Facebook I would definitely message her as if it was my dogs I’d want to know and at least she can ring up and speak to them and find out what’s happening. Would you be willing to take the dogs for two weeks or one of your other neighbours or just to go in and feed/water/walk them yourselves. It seems a bit much calling the RSPCA I’d discuss it with my neighbour first.

Record the noise as evidence.

We leave our dogs at home with our house sitter, who has become a friend after several years of working for us when we go on holiday.

I would want neighbours to ring or Whatsapp me within a couple of hours if they thought anything was wrong with the care we have set up for our pets. We went to Australia for three weeks, and set up our normal measures for our dogs and then additional measures just in case our house/dog sitter was ill. She suddenly had to look after her sister unexpectedly for three days, so a good neighbour kept our dogs in her house while our house sitter was away.

If any problems persisted after 12-24 hours, I would have no problems with concerned neighbours ringing for help if they couldn’t contact me directly. 🐕

Well OP you know the sitter has lied to you so no doubt lied to the owners too. Could you fb stalk a bit and find a relative or close friend and message them too explaining the situation. They may have the mobile number/hotel number/be in contact. You are being a good friend. I feel for you, the dogs and your poor neighbour being let down so badly.

The thing is your neighbour leaves her dogs in the garden to bark herself. And I think you are being very polite about it. Whilst I'm sure two massive dogs put off most bulgars, it not safe for her possessions or dogs to be left outside or left with doors open. They could be stolen and the barking is inconsiderate. I have a dog that occasionally barks and I send him inside if he starts. Why does she do this if she comes home regularly? My dog can certainly wait a hours between wees/ poos and even most elderly dogs can go 3-4 hours. She has set the precedent for the minder saying it's ok to leave the dogs with garden access.

To be honest not many people look after their dogs well enough. I know a home boarder who also has dogs that love it at hers. I personally think the location she has is nice, professional and they have lots of space, woods beside her house, but she is pretty lazy with walks herself. But as they get no company at home and very few walks they seem to love it there. I've seen how keen they are to get in and they just love her company.

If your neighbour is posting up on FB while away, she must have some sort of signal. If you know where she is staying, you could check the facility's listing in TripAdvisor and see if WiFi is supplied.

However, if you are not ''friends'' with her on FB, chances are when using messenger it's going into her ''others'' folder. I can see this clearly enough on my desktop, but not on my mobile devices.

I'm wondering rather than reply to you, she has messaged house sitter and presumed its been resolved because the sitter has fed her a load of garbage too?

In my experience even people who are kind to their dogs and genuinely do love them still don't walk them enough for the dog to be truly happy

Poor dogs they are clearly distressed. The dog warden is the best route the rspca are not always helpful and often slow to respond.

Ask the dog sitter for a contact number for the owner

If you like your neighbour and she loves her dogs I’d contact her before the RSPCA. I do understand your reluctance to spoil her holiday but once they’ve taken them she’ll be lucky to ever get them back. It won’t matter to them if she’s been let down by the person she arranged would look after them. Unfortunately for many reasons I’ve nothing but bad things to say about them but that’s another story.

Just seen that you have been trying to contact her. Hope you can.

I would jot down the movements - or lack of! - from the alleged dog sitter and the dog walker ( has she/he been in evidence?) and contact your neighbour again, setting out your concerns ... the dogs are constantly barking, being left alone for long periods of time etc etc. Ask her to fix the issues as it’s cruel to the dogs and unfair on you and your neighbours. Explain to her that if there isn’t an improvement you’ll have to contact the dog warden as you are worried about the dogs’ welfare.
You could suggest to her that maybe the dog walker might be able to help?
If she really cares about her dogs she is going to want to know and will do something about it. If she is more interested in her holiday then she deserves to get into a bit bother for not looking after her pets properly.

I would contact your neighbour TBH. Most people would not be happy about the fact that their dogs are distressed, also their back door is wide open FFS!.I dont know why people dont use kennels .A young girl is not a great choice as often unreliable!

Also many kennels that are well run are not like being "banged up" at all!.Our girl loves going ,she has a centrally heated room (underfloor) and chicken daily ,Also one 2 one ball play for 30 mins each morning and evening .As she is sociable ,she is allowed playtime with other dogs (supervised).Biscuits before bed and lots of fuss!.Some kennels are good some not .Do your homework and visit as many as you can before making a decision .

Lots of people don’t use messenger on Facebook so in all probability she hasn’t seen the message. You need to her number and call her. The dogs are clearly being neglected under the current arrangement.

Can you put something on her page that she needs to contact you immediately?
I never used to use messenger when i had fb

On messenger if you look at the message usually if she's read it her profile pic will be in a circle next to it. If she's not read it, it'll just be a grey circle. At least you'll know then if she's read it and may not be that interested or hasn't seen it.

@twoheaped how far from Hull are you ?

@MrsGenieGenie about 75 miles.

Hello every1 does anyone know what happened with these dogs?

@twoheaped that is quite far but I suppose it would depend on what direction we were going , your animal holiday cabins sound lovely xx