My neighbour just complainted about my dogs making a noise while we are out.

[sparklymieow]

And how she couldn't hear the tv, I said sorry, but she needs to remember that on a friday night when she is blasting music till 2am and fighting with her other half till 4am!!! And keeping us awake!! I know that dogs winging is annoyimng, but we don't go out together much because of the jack russell (as he hates us going out) and we are trying to get him rehomed. We only went to a hospital appointment with dd2. She said that the dogs has been howling for 4 hours, but we weren't even out that long....

exactly!

I have had numerous problems with my neighbours over my dog.
They complained when I worked because he was noisy in the day and then they moaned about us going on holiday and my mil leaving him at our house when she went to work.
Then we had 3 visits from the RSPCA saying we had been reported for neglect, non of which were true, My neighbours even told the rspca that we had been on holiday for 2 weeks and left him at home on his own (more lies).

i cant understand why people have dogs if they work full time. dogs need to be walked several times a day i thought. its not fair to leave them barking all day and night.

Ooh, can I just defend dog owners?

Dog owners don't like stepping in crap either. And actually it pisses me off doubly when people don't pick it up, (a) because it's gross and (b) because I know that half the other people on the street are going to be looking at me going out with my dogs and blaming me!

I work full-time and have two dogs. They get walked twice a day (which is plenty for a 'normal' dog), come what may. If dh is away, I take the dds with me to walk them on the field at 7.30 a.m. I feel I'm giving my kids an important lesson in responsible pet ownership (i.e. there are duties involved - including picking up crap - and you can't not do them just because it's raining or dark or whatever). They are not normally left for more than 5 hours a day (dh works shifts) though it's sometimes more. They do not bark continuously, and they are definitely not distressed. (I can guarantee this because years ago I did have a dog that got distressed when he was left... and showed it by eating the furniture, carpet, wallpaper... aaargh! And I was a student then, so he wasn't even left for long...!) We got our dogs from rescue homes, who knew what our work situation was,and wouldn't have rehomed the dogs with us if they thought it was cruel!

Until last year, my dogs rarely made a noise. A quick woof if someone rang the bell, but that was about it. Last year the oldest one died, and his pal (who'd never been without him - we got her from Battersea, she'd been a stray) really couldn't cope. She started howling when we left her, and our neighbour complained (rightly - must have been horrible, but we didn't know till the neighbour told us). We didn't really know what to do, but we didn't want to rehome her because she's an elderly dog now (12) and not great with other dogs (though fab with people and especially kids) so I couldn't see her finding a home through a rescue place. Although we weren't keen to get another dog in our current situation (working, etc.) we didn't see any other way round it. So now we have two again. They are lovely dogs and very good. However, recently the same neighbour has complained about them barking. (This is odd, as have just posted on the 'terraced house' thread about this - we share a chimney, so any sound in our hall goes straight through to hers.) They don't bark continuously... they bark at things, like the postman, windowcleaner or whatever. As soon as we knew that the dogs were annoying her, we moved them to the kitchen, which is on the other side of the house. Longer term we are thinking of looking for a detached house. I hate to be a nuisance neighbour (and I hope I'm not), but I love my dogs and wouldn't be without them.

Sorry, got all on my high horse defending dog owners and forgot to reply to Sparkly's original post. I hope you manage to rehome your dog soon, if he's really a PITA. For now, does it make any difference if you leave the radio or TV on for him? What if you leave him with a rawhide chew or something like that? Or you can get ball-type things which you put treats inside, and they have to roll it around to work the treats out through little holes (not sure if I'm describing this very well, sorry). If he's greedy that might keep him occupied.

I'd just explain to the neighbour very calmly that you're doing your best to rehome him and that you're sorry about any noise, but you hope she can be patient, knowing that there's an end in sight. No point getting into an argument about who makes the most noise. If you are nice-as-pie now and apologise, she hasn't got a leg to stand on the next time you have to tell her off for making noise late at night.

Treat ball here

I haven't actually said anything to her about the noise she makes, I do leave the telly on, no difference, the strange thing is that he sleeps downstairs at night and we don't hear a peep out of him until the kids get up and he wants to play. If he knows we are in the house, he doesn't worry but as soon as he realises we are gone, he starts. We don't make a fuss of him when we are leaving and arriving home. He has lots of chewy things but that makes no difference either, its only because we were told that he howls that we knew that he was doing it, because he is silent when we leave and silent when we get home, we were told that about 1 1/2 years ago, since then we have avioded leaving him home alone as much as possible. We thought getting another dog might stop him but now they are both howling... [sob]

When I worked full time I still walked my dog twice a day, looked after a newborn, did all the usual wifey things and still managed to do an evening course. My dog is like one of my children and I would never mistreat him.