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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Neighbour being ridiculous or AIBU?

175 replies

Southwig22 · 11/10/2022 18:57

Today a neighbour stopped me whilst walking my dog and told me I'd been allowing him to "foul" his property. He then showed me his ring doorbell footage of my dog cocking his leg on a bush right on the boundary of his front garden and the public footpath.

I apologised for any offence but also pointed out that's what dogs do - pointed towards my home and that I see dogs urinating on my bushes daily and it's really not a problem. Obviously there are no health risks or anything like there is for dog waste.

Despite me apologising he carried, and said it was damaging his property and he would report me (to who??), at which point I said he was being silly and this is not a reportable problem.

Honestly he was quite polite but AIBU to think he's being utterly ridiculous to approach someone about this.

OP posts:
Giggorata · 11/10/2022 23:14

Boys' lavatories. Why is autocorrect so illiterate?

vipersnest1 · 11/10/2022 23:26

YABU, and you know it. Angry

bluegreygreen · 12/10/2022 00:30

I'd feel ashamed of myself that he'd had to ask.

As a previous poster put it, it's about having respect for other people and their belongings.

sorcerersapprentice · 12/10/2022 00:43

Don't let your dog urinate there. Easy. Problem solved. He asked you politely.
Don't get the hump about it and start criticising him for being weird and needing to get a hobby

Mamai90 · 12/10/2022 01:14

Never heard of anyone complaining of this in all my 40 years. But of course on MN it's a great offence 🤔

Mothership4two · 12/10/2022 01:55

I apologised for any offence but also pointed out that's what dogs do - pointed towards my home and that I see dogs urinating on my bushes daily and it's really not a problem.

He probably read that as a non-apology and that you were making excuses and that was why he carried on. He asked you politely to stop your dog and you have minimised his reasons and complained about him on here.

I too find the "sorry, but..." apology irritating.

Also I would automatically stop my dog weeing on someone else's garden, but, until this post, have never really thought about it

mathanxiety · 12/10/2022 01:56

You were both unreasonable.

You can pull your dog away and make him pee elsewhere. Or stay in your own garden until he gets that first pee out of the way.

He's being a bit of a pompous eejit though, to tackle you about this, and especially to threaten to report you.

Mothership4two · 12/10/2022 01:58

Whatever you, I or the OP thinks @Mamai90 it's something that bothers him and he has asked OP nicely to stop

GlamGiraffe · 12/10/2022 02:05

In spain we fill five litre water bottles ( we've drunk the water and use undrinkable tap water in them), and place them right up against the boundaries of our properties walks, hedges etc. Apparently when dogs see the distorted image through the water it states them away and they don't pee there. Whoyever it works, it works. One litre gear bottles with the label off mighy work too.
You could realise your neighbour that whilst you won't let your pet offend anymore this might also stop any other local culprits too.tuvk them right in and they shouldn't encroach the footpath.
Psibly a good remedy for all victims of local canines with over active bladders!

WiddlinDiddlin · 12/10/2022 03:44

Theres a lot of non-dog people lumping stuff together here.

Dogs weeing in a small yard or garden, emptying their entire bladders in the same space daily - that will stink, particularly on concrete flags or astro turf and it will kill grass if its a fairly shallow soil, and particularly if it is bitch piss (dog piss no where near so murderous to grass).

Dogs scent marking a few drops on the outer leaves of a bush from time to time - no, nowhere near the same damage, you're not pouring litres of piss a week into the roots, and again, dog piss not nearly so bad as bitch piss and far fewer bitches scent mark by cocking their legs up stuff (some do!)

Dogs repeatedly cocking a leg against a wooden gate post or fence post - that will do damage, particularly if the fence/gate owner is not religious about treating their exterior woodwork (but, so will rain, cat piss, fox piss, winter salt grit is particularly nasty stuff and is splashed up and sits on woodwork for ages after just one application on road or pavement)...

Lawns you see with brown circles on due to dog wee... pound to a penny, they own a bitch.

Dogs do need to read the peemail and scent mark - they don't have to do it on someones petunias or wooden fence or gatepost or car wheel, but they do have to do it somewhere, owners should keep this in mind and ensure it's not somewhere it's causing damage or nasty pongs. A simple option is to carry a sports bottle full of tap water and squirt that over the few drops of urine left behind, immediate dilution works wonders to stop it causing damage and stink.

Of course another option is to ensure your planting in the front garden is not trailing over your boundary and into the street where it causes an obstruction and trip hazard and is very tempting for animals to wee on.

If you like gardening and don't want to touch wee or poo... um.. wear gloves? Everything... absolutely everything, is weeing and pooing and scent marking on your garden. From tiny slugs and caterpillars to spiders and mice and stoats and hedgehogs and maybe badgers and otters (here, otters! yup yup) and deer and foxes - badgers and foxes REALLY like to do artistic strategic scent-mark poos on suitable stumps, rockeries and similar.. piles of turds on top of covered trailers, turds standing up on end on tree stumps... often a sign of a larger mammal turf-war going on about territory boundaries. So its a bit silly to get picky about one specific kind of wee out of the billions there will be.

startfresh · 12/10/2022 05:45

@Southwig22 I think I'm petty, but for me it depends on the homeowner.

If their plant is on their property, I will stop my dog (unless I catch him midstream and then it's oops) if they let their plant spill onto the pavement, which is public property, free rein to pee all over the public side of it for my dog 😂

lickenchugget · 12/10/2022 05:49

I pull on my dogs leads so they can’t stop and urinate on other people’s property, it’s disgusting.

AndTwoFilmsByFrancoisTruffaut · 12/10/2022 06:34

SendHelp999 · 11/10/2022 19:26

I hate dogs. And don't have any pets myself. I don't want animals piss all over the front of my house for people to tread into my home when they enter. Or to kill my plants.

Stop being such an entitled dick and make your dog piss elsewhere

😂😂

”I don’t want animals piss all over the front of my house”

So much hyperbole and utter batshittery Confused 🙄

theremustonlybeone · 12/10/2022 06:44

Your neighbour is ridiculous with his threat to report, However I would try to keep my dog away from his plant now. Couldn’t be doing with the hassle. On my street we mainly have little walls or gates and dogs are regularly peeing on them.

Traceyfudge77 · 12/10/2022 06:59

Aaahhh, more bloody dogs and their entitled owners.

olympicsrock · 12/10/2022 07:17

YABU - urine damages plants and you are rude to allow your dog to urinate on other people’s property.

Whattheactualfcku · 12/10/2022 07:19

I’d have taken my dog over to cock his leg up his trouser leg the stupid twat!

Brigante9 · 12/10/2022 07:21

It’ll kill the plant eventually and there’s no need for the dog to pee there, just move him away. I wouldn’t let my lot cock their legs on the neighbour’s plants, it’s just rude.

MossCoveredTree · 12/10/2022 07:41

I have had this - walking dog and it was just sniffing a bush outside a ladies house and she shouted out the window to stop it peeing on her bush. I told her it was only sniffing - I left out that it was probably sniffing another dogs piss.

I try and stop my dogs from pissing on people's gardens - although it would never bother me if a passing dog cocked its leg on my borders.

Lolling at people saying it will kill the plants, how on earth would the UK have any woodland left if all the pissing animals are destroying it.

We as humans are far more damaging to this planet that dog piss.

I think some people have too much time on their hands to start accosting neighbours about such matters. I would honestly want to be taken out and shot before becoming a person who stalks and harasses their neighbours over dog piss.

thelobsterquadrille · 12/10/2022 08:00

Lolling at people saying it will kill the plants, how on earth would the UK have any woodland left if all the pissing animals are destroying it.

I mean, you can "lol" all you like but it's a fact that dog urine does kill plants, especially when they wee in the same spot over a long period of time.

Wild woodland isn't really comparable to a tiny patch of someone's private land on the corner of a busy road either. The urine in woodland is not all concentrated in one tiny spot, for starters.

But also, this is someone's home. You wouldn't go and piss up someone's hedges so why is it okay to let your dog do it?

I say all that as a dog owner/walker - keep your dogs on short leads by roads, and hold them so they're near the gutter and can't physically reach peoples homes and property to pee up them.

MossCoveredTree · 12/10/2022 08:21

@thelobsterquadrille Read that back though - a tiny patch of private land on the corner of a busy road.

If I owned that patch of land, I wouldn't be planting my prized dahlias on it or some kind of fragile cultivated bush. Because I would realise that on the corner of a busy road it is vulnerable to all manner of daily interference and something more robust is needed.

thelobsterquadrille · 12/10/2022 08:23

MossCoveredTree · 12/10/2022 08:21

@thelobsterquadrille Read that back though - a tiny patch of private land on the corner of a busy road.

If I owned that patch of land, I wouldn't be planting my prized dahlias on it or some kind of fragile cultivated bush. Because I would realise that on the corner of a busy road it is vulnerable to all manner of daily interference and something more robust is needed.

But it doesn't matter what you'd do.

It's his property and he shouldn't have to deal with dogs pissing up it. It's not hard to control your dog and stop it pissing up peoples boundaries.

ZeroFuchsGiven · 12/10/2022 08:24

Dog piss stinks, Saying it does not makes you unreasonable just for that alone.

MossCoveredTree · 12/10/2022 08:30

@thelobsterquadrille well it seems to me he has three options:

  1. Set up a chair outside his house and organise a patrol to stop dogs walking past cock a leg on his bush
  1. Video people walking past and then routinely accost them in the street and threaten to report them to the dog piss police
  1. Learn that not everything within life is within his control and to choose his battles.
GooglyEyeballs · 12/10/2022 08:33

Tbh I think it's rude to let your dog piss on someone else's property. Even if it is on the boundary.

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