AIBU to be annoyed neighbour put spikes on the fence?

[SunnyLuny]

We’ve lived in this house for nearly 5 years. At first neighbour was very welcoming and friendly. She’s an older lady (late 60s?) who lives on her own. She used to be lovely to our children. The past 3 years though shes just completely changed. She stopped talking to us, actively avoids us and blanks us. If we smile and say hello when we see her she looks down and pretends we aren’t speaking to her. It’s so bizarre. The only thing that has changed is we got a cat. He is an outdoor cat and admittedly probably does go into her garden.

Today she’s been hammering spikes into the fence! No warning or conversation. Infact whenever we go outside she runs into her greenhouse to hide until we go back in! I think this is so passive aggressive and I’m actually upset that she seems to think she can’t even approach us. We’ve always been friendly. She’s never spoken to us about the cat bothering her. I probably wouldn’t be bothered about the spikes if she had told us beforehand or said she had an issue with the cat. DP thinks I should go speak to her and just ask what’s going on but my parents think I should just ignore it. Aibu if I say something?

I think if it's her own fence she is allowed to do this but I do find it rather sad. Cats are in my view free spirits and whilst they aren't wild creatures they are animals - it think its sad as spikes seem such an aggressive measure. Perhaps she could have tried other methods in the garden to keep cats away.

To stop speaking to you and not making eye contact after previously being friendly is pretty childish. She could have had a quiet word with you about the cat if the cat is a problem for her. She was probably worried about your reaction but it’s still ridiculous behaviour on her part🤷🏻‍♀️

If it’s your fence she can’t attach things to it.

I wouldn’t keep my cat indoors, but I’d ask her if the car poops in her garden and I’d ask if she would like me to go and clean it up for her.

Cats are allowed to roam and there is nothing anyone can do about it. (I don’t have a cat by the way).

Thanks to everyone with your opinions. I do understand now perhaps she thought it easier or didn’t think I’d be receptive.

I don’t mind cat proofing measures. I would even keep him indoors. I’m not asking her to remove the spikes. I just find the hostility towards me bizarre when I’ve never been informed of an issue. I haven’t been sitting and watching the cat shit in her garden. All I want is peace between us, which is why I made this post asking if it would be unreasonable for me to talk to her. Not to get mad at her or tell her to take them down but to see what I can do to help. I’m going to send a card through and apologise for if the cat has been bothering her. I’ll put cat deterrents on the rest of the fences.

It's called empathy and situational awareness. You shouldn't have to be bluntly informed that your family is creating a nuisance and making someone else's life miserable.

I had the cat for just under a year before she stopped talking me.

So I’m a cat lover and have 2 cats myself (they don’t leave my garden) however, my neighbours cat comes in our garden, shits in the flower beds, the veg patch and kills the birds (I’ve had to stop feeding them). So I totally understand how she feels, even as a cat lover and owner!!

I don't like cats, they scare me actually because when I was wee my Gran had a big bully of a cat who used to love digging his claws in! Even so, I can't understand why some people get so annoyed about them. Our community FB page is full of angry posts about cats shitting in gardens. If someone's cat shits in my garden, I just pooper scoop it. Your neighbour is an old rascal for putting spikes on the fence. If it's a shared fence, I'd remove them - maybe then she'll approach you and actually tell you what her problem is.

This argument holds no weight, unless we live in a world where unsuspecting cat owners have a cat forcibly billeted with them and have no say in the matter.

People are perfectly entitled to have a pet and have quiet enjoyment of it, as long as they are not causing a nuisance to their neighbours and it wouldn't be dangerous if it got out. I'd stand up for anybody on that point. Live and let live.

What they are not entitled to do is to decide the entire neighbourhood gets to have a pet and "enjoy" the benefits of that animal, ie ipso facto cat faeces, mess, work and smell on their property. You do not get to do that to your neighbours, and it's entitled and selfish to think that you do.

" I haven't seen it" or "I didn't know" simply doesn't wash. If it's not producing copious amounts on your property as the owner, where exactly do you think it's happening? Do you imagine it's strolling nonchalantly for exercise a la Colditz, and shaking tiny little inoffensive balls of shite down its trouser legs?

If you have a cat, and you don't live remote from others, you are very probably introducing a problem to your neighbours.

Cats are a real nuisance round here. I hate finding cat poo in my flower beds, especially when it gets on my hands or gardening tools.

If cats are not trained to use a litter tray then obviously they are crapping elsewhere. The owner should be aware of this and offer as much help to neighbours as possible including frequent garden cleans.

When we had one very regular offender, crapping in the same place every day I picked it up with a trowel and left it on the owner's doorstep each evening. So they decided to keep it indoors rather than deal with the poo. Why they thought it was ok to just let it out and crap anywhere was totally beyond me. Such self centred ignorance.

Just cat proof it, and pop a note through saying 'I hadn't realised the cat coming onto your property was an issue, I have now cat-proofed so he can't.'

Then forget about it.

It might be bugger all to do with you in reality, maybe she's lost her marbles and the spikes are to stop the drone pigeons landing and spying on her. She hasn't communicated with you, her behaviour has changed quite dramatically toward you, this could well be entirely a 'her' problem and not a 'you' problem at all.

I think your approach is very reasonable.

I hope you can resolve matters with your NDN.

You’ve done nothing wrong OP, ignore the ableists on this thread who just want a pile on (and seemingly don’t understand a thing about Autism, especially @Zanzara- Calling a person who has stated they are Autistic “unobservant” is plain ableism and you should be ashamed of yourself.

OP, your neighbour sounds like a coward. I’m going through something similar to you, only I don’t have a cat and my neighbour suddenly turned and started a campaign of anger towards us without bothering to share why (we’re very quiet, very rarely have visitors and look after our home so 🤷🏻‍♀️) and like your neighbour, totally ignores any attempt from me to communicate and ask why. It’s crazy but she’s a coward, as is your neighbour. Whatever you or your cat have done wrong, sulking and ghosting like a teenager is nothing short of cowardly and achieves nothing!

There's a thread on Gardening about just this thing:

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/gardening/5323245-im-sick-of-selfish-neighbours-and-their-cats

It has some very good suggestions as to how to deter cats from your garden (I may have contributed a suggestion)

"Surely, it's mark of an adult to tell people if something is bothering you"

There are so many threads on MN where the OP really, really, doesn't want to do that (not just in a cat situation but any sort of vaguely confrontational situation)

Well I've already posted above but I would like to add, having lived in situations with neighbour issues, and moved because of them, I think if you make this into a " big thing" with your neighbour you will truly regret it.

If the worst thing is she doesn't want to speak to you and has put up spikes on the fence, then, whilst it isn't ideal and pleasant, be assured it could be a million times worse.

And believe me neighbours problems can reach extreme levels of unpleasantness. And end up costing people money silly amounts in civil actions with no amicable resolutions.

My neighbour at a previous home actually put up spikes on the fence because he really objected to my feeding the birds and said I was attracting pigeons. Ignoring the fact he and his family regularly ate in his garden and the pigeons were attracted by the scraps of good. Six of one, half a dozen of the other. The spikes were a welcome relief after all the verbal aggression about it.

The late Roger Scruton was brilliant on the ethics of cat ownership (https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-26383063.amp). It may be legal to let cats roam, but it is immoral for sure.

"Both dogs and cats are predators, but dogs can be trained not to kill. They can be trained to focus their hunting instincts on a particular species, or they can be bred to focus the very same instincts on some other and more humanly useful pursuit... Not so cats. Everything in their nature tends towards the single goal of killing, and although they can be pampered into relinquishing this goal, they are by that same process pampered into relinquishing their nature. A true cat wants out, and when out he or she wants death. The distinctions between fair and unfair game, between vermin and protected species, between friend and foe - all such distinctions have no significance for a cat, which sets off from the house in search of songbirds, field mice, shrews and other harmless and necessary creatures with no thought for anything save the taste of their blood. One estimate puts at 180 million the number of wild birds and mammals lost to cats each year in Britain. The domestic cat is, without exception, the most devastating of all the alien species that have been brought onto our island."

I know these types of threads typically attract extreme opinions etc but in all honesty OP I am struggling a bit to see what has annoyed you - and wonder, therefore, if you are clear yourself?

You started by saying AIBU to be annoyed about the spikes.
Then it was not about the spikes but about them being put up without notice.
Then it was about 3 years of blanking you.

In truth I suspect the final is probably the closest to the truth - that you are upset that you think the relationship between you has soured somehow.

I only mention it because, if you want to think of possible next steps then being clear with yourself WHAT is really upsetting you, is important.

Agreed - and in fact I’ve done so, when my neighbour’s cat was coming into my garden to beat up my cat. I asked my neighbours if they were ok with me putting up cat-proofing spikes to stop their cat coming into mine, they weren’t, so I didn’t - it was a perfectly grown up conversation like adults have.

Ok I'm coming right back at you on this one.

Firstly, my entire post was very mildly phrased and intended to be helpful, and OP herself responded to it and took it in that spirit ( as did others).

Secondly, ironically, if you yourself were a little more observant, you would have noticed how closely timed the OP's post stating that and mine were. I was already typing and posting when she dropped that information late into the thread.

If there's any shame going round here, you and your faux outrage on behalf of someone else can have it.

What would you do to stop your cat crapping on her land?

Our neighbour has a cat. He’s lovely, really beautiful, but was an absolute menace to society with his shitting and bird-murdering.

The neighbour on the other side of us complained and the cat stopped visiting. Saw him out being walked on a lead the other day. The indignity 😂

What a nasty thing to say when OP has explained she is ND and struggles to read between the lines.

Thank you, honestly some of the responses here have upset me. I’ve never done anything with bad intentions. I genuinely didn’t (and still don’t) know if the cat is crapping in her garden. I know that everyone thinks I’m being self absorbed for that but I thought she just didn’t like me anymore.

You do know. She’s put up spikes.