My neighbour's dog killed our lovely cat.

[manyhands]

Well the title says it all. They called the police as we said they had a dangerous dog. They said the dog jumped over a six foot wall ( a greyhound) and escaped and well it's a hunting dog anyway! Needless to say the kids are heartbroken. Is there anyone else I should report the incident too.

TBH, if my neighbours had behaved so callously towards me after their dog had killed one of my cats, I'd be looking to break their legs and throttle the dog.

To put their attitude into context, my cat killed our neighbours pet chicken who was wandering loose in their garden. When she told me, I was mortified, she got abject (and many) apologies and a massive bunch of flowers, because whilst to me it was "just a chicken", to her, it was a pet she loved and I respected that was the case.

Your neighbours are completely moronic to behave the way they did.

My Cat has just been killed by a dog too, the dog owner had the dog on a lead and still could not stop it.

Hi all,

Last year our cat was killed by the neighbor's greyhound. We have no interest in prosecuting or having the dog destroyed. We do, however, have 2 other cats. We are having trouble with the owner's refusing to muzzle the dog when he is in the garden. As all cat owners know, there is no way of stopping the cats roaming. All we ask is that the dog is muzzled. This has been met with them saying that it is unfair to muzzle him for longer than 20 mins at a time. As the warmer weather is here we are unable to have any windows open as the cats can push them past the safety catches (old windows, no finances to replace all of them either) we have tried to explain that there would be no issues if the dog was muzzled when they had the doors open. All we would like is to avoid the same thing happening. We were devastated when the other cat died. Any suggestions or advice would be greatly received. I have tried to look for advice regarding safe muzzle times for dogs and have struggled to find much.

Thanks in advance.

We have a lurcher ( greyhound saluki cross) and when she was 9 months old she kept jumping our 6 foot fence , and running around the neighbour's garden, so we've have to put a 2 foot extension on the top of our fence. She's not got out since.
She will chase anything that moves but stops when they stop so lives quite happily with two of our cats that refuse to run. Our third cat runs every time and she will chase him.
A lot of sight hounds do chase and attack, especially if they come from a hunting/ racing background. If they have a very high prey drive, then they should be contained and muzzled.

I don't think you can insist that a dog remain muzzled inside its own garden, especially if it's safely fenced in.
You can get special fencing ( google protectapuss) to keep your cats in your garden though, that would keep your cats safe.

Hello. Some people here might remember my post about 6 weeks ago, when my dog killed a cat that attacked him in an apparently empty field. Without going through it all again, the upshot was that my dog remains on lead at all times in public now, and 2 vets and the owner (eventually) agreed that unfortunately that's what dogs do.

In your case I gather things were slightly different in that the dog scaled a 6ft fence (which could reasonably be expected to contain the dog unless he had form for escaping), then attacked and killed your cat in your own garden. As a dog owner I would be horrified if my dog did that and the first thing I would do would be to either make the fence higher or put something on top of it to make damned sure he couldn't escape again. I would not be prepared to muzzle him on my own property and I would be aware that most cats are clever enough to know which gardens to avoid (all the cats I've ever owned certainly were and I bet yours was too). But I would not be held responsible for my dog attacking any small furry that entered his territory in the same way that I would not feel responsible had my cat eaten an escaped hamster, for example.

I would keep a watchful eye on what your neighbours do to prevent their dog escaping again, and if they do nothing then the RSPCA or maybe a PCO need to have a little word with them on the legal importance of ensuring their dog is under control at all times.

My dog can easily scale a 6 ft fence because his paws are small enough to use the slats as a gripping point. When we first had the chickens we erected a 6ft fence (3ft concrete gravel boards,3ft wooden fence panel) to separate him from that part of the garden. It was actually quite comical -by the time I lifted the fence board and shoved him through the hole, then started to climb over, he had already scaled the fence and was up by the chicken pen harassing the chickens.

Two cheap solutions - 1. Turn the fence panels so the slats point downwards and don't provide a grip.

1. Attach some smooth metal to the fence -we have fine this on our gate. Try as he might he can't get a grip for his back paws, so we can have a 5 foot gate because he can't grip the gate to scale it.

OP I'm so sorry, hope the kitten helps you

On another note, there's no way my dog would be being muzzled in it's own garden. I'd kindly suggest you stay responsible for your own cat and keep it out of my garden. I would make it absolutely impossible for my dog to get over to your garden

and it's not a case of 'all we ask', it's a massive thing to keep a dog muzzled!

Crystal and morphine, the dog escaped from the garden and killed the ops cat on the ops driveway. The dog owners should raise the fence, or make sure the dog is muzzled whenever it is out of the house. Or rehome it to a more responsible owner.

I wasn't replying to the OP I was replying to lullaby123

And even so, the dog owners SHOULD raise the fence but it shouldn't be muzzled in it's garden.

This is a very old thread people, confused the hell out of me that I had already posted on it when I was reading it, until I realized it was two years old, thought I was having a very senile moment

Only way dog can cool down in this heat is through its tongue, so being muzzled in own garden in this weather would be very bad.

Still, your neighbours' attitude stinks, and they are irresponsible not yo take this seriously, and showing lack if empathy/manners in not apologising profusely.

I have a greyhound-whippet cross, and my neighbours have to cheeky cats who roam our garden, poo on our doorstep and taunt the dog. They even walk into our kitchen, LOL.

I am worried one day my dog's hunting instinct might awaken, but so far the cats rule and my whippety grey is acting like a wuss, thankfully.

I hope your neighbours change their attitude and their fence.

There's a poster who wants some advice a few posts up.

Oh fair enough morphine. I missed lullabys post. In which case I agree with you. Theres no way I would muzzle my dog in my garden so that someones cat can wander freely through it and shit in my veg patch. . No chance whatsoever.

Sorry, missed that , only got as far as my previous posts, as you were.

Sorry to hear about your cat. How awful for you.

My neighbours cat killed my bunny and I was told it was just what cats do. I suppose it's the same for dogs really.

I hadn't realised I was meant to be replying to Lullabye's post and not the OP.

Sorry Lullabye but YABVU. As long as the dog is on its owner's property you would be VU to expect it to be muzzled in case your cat is daft enough to wander in. As I said earlier, cats are very canny at working out which gardens to stay out of so I'm sure yours will be fine. But if you're worried it might stray next door then it's going to be your responsibility to net your garden to stop your cat escaping, not your neighbour's responsibility to muzzle their dog.

I'm afraid I'd think my neighbours were bonkers if they asked me to do that, and mine have a rabbit which I make very sure my lurcher has no chance to catch sight of (big fence and locked gate).

Our two very gentle friendly dogs killed a neighbour's pet rabbit many years ago. My 90 year old mil let the dogs out 'for a little play'! The rabbit was in the garden and the dogs got through from the back field and killed it. The neighbours were devastated and so were we. I rang our vet to ask if the dogs were potentially dangerous as I would have had them put to sleep. He said that all dogs have it in their nature to kill rabbits and only if they attacked people was it a concern.
Interestingly they lived in perfect harmony with our cats.
You have had a horrible experience but the dog is not dangerous. It is a greyhound and doing what nature meant it to do. Your neighbours are at fault for letting it get free. They need to secure their garden.

my cat got killed by 2 dogs today that was in my front garden
needless to say if the law fails me im taking it into my own hands ive had that cat for 14 years and this will not be forgotten about

Oh, how horrible for you and your poor cat.

I can't imagine how awful it is for you.

This just happend to me today :( my cat got killed by a dog

Oh God! So very sorry Eddie. Poor poor kitty. No words really but can imagine how shocked and heartbroken you must be xxxx