Law around soaking neighbours pets?!

[TurmericFan]

My next door neighbour's large dog always barks extremely aggressively when I go out of my side-return door and then down my garden path. This is very disturbing and is negatively affecting my ability to enjoy my garden.

There is a gap in the fence which it runs to, and it looks straight at me barking with full intensity aggression. So now I carry a water-bottle and I will get it right between the eyes whenever this happens. (This gap is where the fence goes around a protected tree which is on the boundry line).

I intend to continue soaking it until the owners stop the dog from doing this.

I understand that legally speaking the dog is the neighbour's property. Am I 'damaging' it in some way by doing this?

It is not in my garden when this is happening. But I don't think there's any kind of trespeass because although the water is going into the neighbour's garden, I am not.

Am I legally safe to keep on doing this, until such time as the neighbours pay to send their dog to doggie behavioural classes/to live on a farm somewhere?

Also, as I embark upon this course of behaviour, I find myself wondering about my own cat, who goes where he likes into other neighbour's gardens.

Would a neighbour who didn't like cats, whose flowerbeds were being trampled, etc, be permitted to soak my cat? Because I'm sure I wouldn't like it if that happened...

They didn't come round to apologise, they started talking to me when they saw me on the road. With hindsight I was too friendly when this happened as I was surprised they were talking to me, so I just brushed it off instead of discussing it.

The dog doesn't bark to be let in, it barks just for the hell of it! And whenever it hears anything at all around it. Which in a row of terraced houses, some of which are houses and some are flats, is going to be most of the time.

I understand that yes they let the dog out first thing when they wake up to let the dog 'do its business'. Probably before they've had their breakfast, got dressed, etc. But I do not think this is reasonble behaviour. They should wait until it is a reasonable time (after 8am), or take the dog out for a walk instead.

I've only soaked the dog 2 or 3 times by the way and 'soaked' is an over-statement, I just mean I've squirted it from a plastic water bottle like you'd take to the gym or on a bicycle.

Squirt the neighbours every time their dog barks.

Yes clearly I need to do this. Though I will need to get something specially made because it needs to go around the contours of the tree that is on the boundary.

Hah, now there's an idea!

Or maybe a boombox playing this every time the dog starts up... Bit obvious but would soon work...

Letting the dog outside isn't the problem and there is no time limit on that. The dog barking is the problem.

You either need to talk to your neighbours, or complain via the council re noise. But you also need to stop squirting it with water as you are adding to the problem.

I do get it - a dog barking constantly does grate on your nerves. But you need to go talk to your neighbours about it. At least in the first instance.

It helps if you know the reason it is barking. And can you tell the difference between a dog barking, and the local fox being vocal. Every fox mating season my area gets ppl complaining about a local dog barking all hours. Its our local fox rounding up his family.

Foxes sound nothing like dogs barking. They shriek! How can anyone mistake them for a dog?

My rule would be that if a neighbour soled my pet, I would ring their bell and throw a bucket of water on them.

See, this is the reason why I think the neighbours are likely to do anything. And they are really unlikely to pay for a dog trainer! I'm not important enough to them, as I don't hold much/any power of them and nothing much is at stake for them. (I'm sure the council have bigger noise issues to deal with.)

The few times I've known people to pay for dog trainers for their adult dogs, it's been in circumstances that have been more consequential to them personally. For instance one couple found that their 'doodle' would snarl/bite their toddler when it would yank on its tail. So either the dog (or toddler) stopped doing this or they were going to rehome the dog.

If the dog's general barking were an issue, then I could expect lots of other neighbours to be approaching them. If this isn't happening, then they won't think it's an issue. But it doesn't address the problem of it specifically barking when I am going down the side of the house and it hear me on the other side of the fence.

Anyway, I should also concede that they are not home all of the time, so it doesn't happen every time I go out there. I can usually look out of the upstairs window into their garden and see if it's there. In fact I can see it is not there right now. Time for me to make the most of it!

But then what if your neighbour has a rule about what to do to people that throw buckets of water over them!?

These things can escalate.

*soaked

@TurmericFan street-wide water bomb fight?

It might be possible to make 'friends' with the dog so that it stops broadcasting the stranger alarm every time it sees you. I've managed this with a neighbour dog by talking to it in wheedling, kutchy-koo babytalk. He seems to think we're mates now, and he's even passed the info on to the new dog the neighbours acquired 😆

I think soaking the dog is fine.

But please teach your cat to shit in a littery tray or in its own garden. Shitting cats are a bloody menace and the neighbour is within their rights to log it into your garden preferbaly into a window (the shit not the cat)

Well done, that sounds an ideal solution! It is strange how sometimes you can get the same dog of the same breed, living in fairly similar environments, yet in one case the dog will either be totally placid or will actually run up to any new person wanting to be friends with them. But in other cases the same kind of dog will responds to anyone outside of its owners by going in to stranger-danger attack mode.

Dogs are funny creatures....

So you have banged on the fence and are now squirting water at the dog and you STILL haven't spoken to the neighbour?

Why don't you give him some treats to try to make friends with him? Surely squirting him will only make him more aggressive and bark even more?

I mean, if my dog barked and you sprayed him I wouldn't mind at all but I just think he'd bark even more next time he saw you.

Do not put your hands near his mouth in case he catches your hand. Just put a piece of board against the gap a stone at the base, and fix at the top. They may not see the barking as a problem.Its easy some times to dismiss it as a problem if its your own dog/child been noisy.

OP cook up a chicken breast and chop into small chunks. Over the next couple of day everytime the dog stops barking, give him a chunk of chicken. Doggo will have learnt before you've used up all the chicken.

Once he's there, keep him topped up with fridge leftovers to remind him that you're a good thing that provides food when he's quiet. Mine loves the ends of carrots, cucumbers, green beans and left over potatoes.

Ridiculous idea. I'd be very cross if someone was feeding my dog without telling me.

Splashing with water, I have no problem with

But please don’t feed my dog. I’m sure one of them doesn’t tolerate cooked chicken very well because she gets the squits after it. So we don’t let her have any. I will be pissed if she had a stomach upset because someone was feeding my dogs food

You should be able to smell the difference.

Fox poo is RANK!