Neighbours complaining about my dog peeing in MY garden

[liferr]

Our back garden is extremely muddy right now due to all the rain. It means letting my dog out for a wee involves a major clean up job.

In order to avoid mucking up my cream carpets, it's a lot easier just to take my dog to the front garden (where it isn't muddy at all as the grass is extremely thick) in order for her to relieve herself.

This morning I got a letter from next door asking me to stop using my front garden as a toilet. I'm gobsmacked! In no way does her wee running onto their property. There's no smell or discolouration so not sure why they care. My dog does not disturb anyone (ie no barking) imo.

It's only number 1's we're talking about, she only poops at the park!

AIBU to ignore them completely?

I knocked on the door earlier as I was intrigued to know their reasoning. No answer.

(I've included a generic pic of a house with very similar garden and house proportions for context - sorry for random squares but have use photo from google and don't want to invade privacy of owners)

Buy a couple of plastic dog turds and see if she goes and picks them up?

Have they got nothing else to get worked up over?

Bitch urine does tend to cause bare patches of lawn where the grass dies - perhaps it is the future appearance of the grass where their concerns lie. But it isn't their grass anyway, its yours.

We do exactly the same OP - ours dogs pee in the front garden in the winter as its less messy.

No one elses business but ours.

They sound batshit.

Ignore.
Doesnt justify a response.
Dont waste your time or energy thinking about it.

Tell them it helps the grass to grow and would they like your dog to wee on their too.

Engaging with people like that is the route to madness. Be grateful for small mercies ie they contacted you via a letter rather than face to face. Ignore. If they do speak to you about it, then you can truthfully say you knocked to discuss.

I think the most sensible thing to do is to totally ignore the letter, but get a toilet bowl and put it in the middle of your lawn. Tell them it's going to be a planter but never plant anything in it.

That'll learn 'em.

Go and curl out a big one on your lawn and leave it

a 'wee' bit of training ehh

I'm only stirring but chuckle to myself if you could wind up your neighbours a tad

Yanbu about this but yabu for letting your dog pop in the park. Even if you pick it up, there's still residue left, which is gross for everyone else using the park. Maybe train him to also poo in your own garden.

@Aderyn19 to be fair OP could mean a dog park.

You don't call her in afterwards do you? (the dog, not the neighbour )

We had neighbours that used to let their dogs out into a communal area at 6.45 every morning, then stand at the door beneath our bedroom window and yell at them to come in again. Every. Single. Day.

I had no problem with the dogs wee, but was driven mad by her bloody shouting. 3 years, and in all that time we only had a lie in was the couple of times they went on holiday. I genuinely don't think she realised how much of a disruption it was. (Until after about 6 months when we pointed it out. Then she just carried on anyway.)

If that's the case then I apologise.

Wow... What a lot of aggressive suggestions here. Good luck living next door with these neighbours if you act on this advice!

For goodness sake, just talk to them. Normally. Nicely. If it really does upset them is it the end of the world to walk down the road a bit? You don't want a big palaver with your neighbours.

I'd go with the advice in the first reply.

If it really does upset them is it the end of the world to walk down the road a bit?

Hahahahaha! 1/10

I wonder if she’s got a strong sense of smell and can smell the wee?

I would ignore the note OP. If your dog is in your garden (and you're not waking the neighbours by screaming for her to come back inside) then it's nothing to do with anyone else.
I don't understand these people who say 'just talk to them'. The neighbour is the one who instead of talking to the OP put a note through her door telling her to stop doing something in her own garden. It seems to me that the neighbour has started the palaver.

How very bizarre.

My dog currently uses our front garden for the exact same reason - I keep expecting my neighbours to start complaining as I live opposite a couple who have made it VERY clear they don't like our dog (poor bugger has to practically live in silence as at the slightest half-bark, Vinegar Face is at her window glaring over).
Amazingly we've not had a complaint yet but if we do, they'd be getting their letter back through the door with a watermark of his pee-stained pawprint!
Seriously though, if your dog isn't making noise, smells or doing it on anyone else's property or the public areas then it's up to you whether pup pees in your front or back garden (wonder if your neighbours are related to mine)

Our garden is split in 3 for this very reason!
Tis like crop rotation, good enough for the farmers, good enough for me.

Some people who don't like dogs can be picky in my experience. Is yours a bitch? (Your dog, not your neighbour.) If so they might have confused her sitting for a wee with doing some more heavyweight, especially if it's a bit overgrown/in the evening and they don't see you scoop it up. Some cantankerous bastards people don't like the urine turning the green grass a light brown in the summer. The rest of them are just dickheads I prefer dogs

I think a delivery of horse manure might be in order.

This is nice too.

Thanks for the reassurance.

My dog is mostly walked in the woods (what I meant by park). It's really only used by dog walkers. It takes hours of hanging around to get her to poop in the garden - gets distracted. Luckily she can pee on demand but unfortunately this doesn't extend to number 2s.

Dog naturally goes somewhere people do not step.

Not ideal but I do my best.