Entire flock killed. What would you do?

[Slinkytoys]

If you don't stand up for yourself this WILL happen again. I agree with alerting the landlord about the insurance company notification. It's amazing what that little tidbit will do.
Small claims court would be a good idea. If nothing else it may impress upon the child what can happen when you don't follow the law.
Slinky

 

[13newbabies]

I am so very sorry for your loss, what a hideous, hideous situation. This may sound horrible, but it actually made me feel slightly better about my recent very stressful and sad situation. I dont say that to make you feel bad, just to let you know that there are people out here who are GOOD people, who could never even think of the irresponsible, immoral acts that some people do everyday. I too live in Northern California in the moutains (although not as high as you). Forgive me, because this is a bit of a long saga, but I have been wanting to write to BYC about this, and you have given me the opportunity to share my pain with you. Last April 13, 2009, I came home to find SEVEN of my 13 chickens massacred all over my yard.Heads and bodies strewn across my kids play area (I too have two young toddlers). My chickens were secured in a large dog kennel that was clearly jumped on until the gate gave way. Our babies were 6 months old and hand raised by my 2 and 4 year old. They were truly pets. We all grieved for MONTHS and had nightmares for weeks. We buried them with a beautiful cross right next to our house. We had NO idea whose dogs could've done this. We live on a long windy mountain road, with very little knowledge of our neighbors. Although many people who live in the mountains think it is ok to let their dogs run free, we had never seen any loose dogs in our area. I contacted animal control, but was told there was nothing they could do because I didn't see who did it.
Several months later, my husband heard a disturbance and looked out to see a large rhodesian ridgeback jumping on the chicken cage. He ran out to stop it, but the dog ran away, however not before my husband saw a man and woman walking away off of our property with two more dogs, and the dog he saw chasing after them. Afterwards, we also found out that this dog (or dogs) had entered an open door in our garage and peed on our carpet in the childrens playroom. Once again, we had NO IDEA who these people were, we had never seen them before. So once again, I reported it, but was again told nothing could be done because we didnt know who the offenders were.
Finally, on February 13, 2010 (10 months after the first episode) I walked outside to find two strangers, a man and a woman standing right next to my chicken house (which is 20 feet from my front window) there were three very large rhodesian ridgebacks running frantically around, feathers everywhere and these two people were unable to contain or control their dogs. I screamed and yelled "who are you, what are yoiu doing here, catch the darn dogs, etc" It literally took them at least 7 minutes while I was out there for these people to contain their dogs. These people had NO LEASHES (not even in their pockets), they had to walk RIGHT in front of my front door to get there, they fully admitted"we have been walking our dogs here for 5 years"....despite the fact that we built our house and moved in 3 years ago. THey admitted to walking REPEATEDLY thru our property for the last 5 years, with NO PERMISSION, never even bothering to introduce themselves (despite being "neighbors"). In this episode (the THIRD), I finally caught them, but not before their darn dogs killed 3 more of our babies. Making our loss a total of 10 of our original 13 chickens KILLED BY IRRESPONSIBLE PEOPLE. My three and five year olds buried TEN of their pets in the last TEN months.
I contacted the police, as well as animal control, and got this...."THERE IS NOTHING WE CAN DO"
Come to find out, "No Trepssing laws" are virutally unenforceable (you must have signs EVERY 1/4 mile the entire perimeter of your property AND you have to have caught the people before and WARNED them in order to prosecute them) We have 20 acres of redwood forest (impossible to fence or have signs as frequently as needed)
And because we have NEVER CAUGHT these people on our property, it doesnt matter that they fully admitted to REPEATEDLY USING OUR PROPERTY FOR THE LAST 5 Years, and that we did see them, but we didnt KNOW them, so couldnt WARN them.
So, we go thru agony AGAIN, we actually CATCH the offenders in the act and "THERE IS NOTHING WE CAN DO"
These people are BREEDERS and TRAINERS of RHodesian RIdgebacks, so FULLY aware of what they are capable of, not to mention these people REPEATEDLY walked past our chickens, their dogs have killed our chickens before, and yet they kept coming back. Their "so-called" show dogs PEED in our house and were virtually unable to be caught (so much for their fabulous training..)
Basically, there is NO EXCUSE for the deaths of our pets, nor the deaths of yours. People like this are completely IMMORAL, IRRESPONSIBLE and it is so very sick that these people will face NO CONSEQUENCES for their actions. We and our children will have the nightmares and suffer the grief, and they will just go along through life without a thought or care for anyone or anything else. I am so very sorry for your loss, I REALLY can relate, it is a horrible situation, made worse by no justice. What terrible things our children learn about life and the cruelty of so many people out there.
I hope that you and your children will be able to heal, and I hope you had taken pictures of your babies, that is all we have left of our sweet and irreplaceable Lucky, Sunshine, Whisper, Mamasan, Black Beauty, Grey, Ginger, Mary Poppins, Amelia and Isabella. Rest in peace
Take care of yourself, and I am so sorry that man is your neighbor.

 

[chickenwhisperer]

Quote:
This tell me EVERYTHING I need to know . . .


Didnt read the 6 pages . . .

If you are asking what I would do, Id make sure that my new pen is predator-proof so that ANY animal cant get in.


Do you know what a hassle the legal process is over these things . . . ?
Despite any claims from well-meaning folks here, are a few chickens worth multiple days off work, trying to PROVE it in court(dont even try to ask for money without at least a copy of a receipt(small claims in Ca doesnt accept "emotional trauma"), AND becoming total enemies of an apparantly unstable, alcoholic neighbor?
Even IF you won a small claims case, its up to YOU to collect.
And the law is so bent, he could give you $1 a month and the state considers that a payment . . .

I know it sucks, but unless it affected your LIVELIHOOD, think of it in the sense of "lesson learned" . . .
I learned it from my own dogs . . .


Ive also heard of ppl mentioning turning it into their homeowners insurance . . .
Seriously???

 

[drumstick diva]

13new babies - what a horrible thing to have happen and the gall of those people. Many years ago my doctor told me of his family being terrorized by a neighbors loose Ridgeback, it cost him $3000 in legal fees to have something done.These are not cuddly, lovable pets.

Would it help if you had game cams stationed where you could catch this idiots doing what they do? Would your local newspaper do an article? I used to show dogs and I'm wondering if you could approach whatever Rhodesian Ridgeback club may be in your area, about the negativity this is raising about the breed - which they certainly would frown upon. You could google the breed and see if anything useful pops up.

 

[Siler]

Wow what a horror story! I too am very attached to my girls and would be horrified if anything happened to them. We all have to predator/stupid neighbor-proof out girls.

Taking pictures was a good idea to have proof to go after him legally. If you're prepared and willing to fight then I'd go after him legally. There's no telling how it might end. It's true that in California it is illegal to keep a dog on a chain for more than 3 hours. I wish that's how Indiana law was, but it's not. It's cruelty to leave a dog on a chain for it's life. Can you imagine how insane that dog would get after a while?? Not all dogs are vicious killers like that. My dog is a Lab/Pitt bull mix and he's the sweetest thing. He's careful with the chickens and with all other animals. Of course he's never been on a chain in his life and he doesn't have some drunken madman leading him to do horrible things. I've trained him to be calm and obey and soon he'll be certified as a therapy dog by taking the Good Citizen test.

This man's kids seemed to think this was funny. Perhaps CPS should be called. You said they found this funny that "dad got drunk *again* and let the dog loose". What kind of environment are these kids living in?

There are many useful suggestions here. I hope you find the answers you're looking for and hope this proves useful to others reading this as well. Good luck.

 

[O(akly270]

I'll keep this short and sweet for lack of time. I have had this problem a few years back. One particular dog kept coming and mauling my chickens . It was a free ranging dog from up the road. Hope I don't get in trouble on here for what I'm about the say, but the last time he came he was met with 100 gran of GRIM REAPER! I have had no more problems with dogs!

 

[sheridangirl]

I sympathize with your plight. It is very difficult to lose your flock..I lost most of mine about 4 years ago to a weasel...My pen was I thought very secure but I guess he dug under it...So we burried chicken wire in the ground around the coop.
I understand how you feel about the neighbor dog and I realize that the dog needs to find a good owner. He was only doing what comes natural and the owner should be beat for making that dog stay on a chain all of the time...That is no life for a dog....
Here is my story about my own dog. She is a border collie and we rescued her as an adult dog who had some behavior issues. It didn't take us long to figure out she liked chickens...for dinner.
We used an electronic training collar on her and every time she even glanced at a chicken, she got a slight zap in her neck. She is very smart and it only took about 3 zaps to get her to understand. It has been a year and she still won't even look at a chicken. Problem solved and no more dead chickens and we still have our dog....

 

[95yj]

don't blame the dog, it was just being a dog, its their nature and they don't know any better. My family kept dogs before we kept birds, we were always good dog owners and our dogs were well trained [our first dog was chasing a deer ounce and came back when we called him, while chasing the deer] But their are a couple people in our neighborhood who don't keep their dogs in their yards, and quite honestly, i'm fine with that. the dogs are all friendly and my pens are dog proof, and if the neighbors want to let the dogs run around then its up to them. I'm sure that if i asked them to keep the dog in their yard they would, and i understand what you are all saying, but please, it isn't the dogs fault, so don't have him put down or thrown into a shelter.

 

[PeepsInc]

I just wanted to say I'm Sorry to read about your loss. There is no amount of money that can make up for the time & feelings you had invested in your flock. People that raise chickens know that there's no way of replacing them. There all unique (like saying you can replace your kids) ....I was appalled to read about his kids reaction. It seems as tho they may be leading a troubled life....The whole situation is a sad one........but,Chin up! Every cloud has a silver lining.

 

[cdmaze]

Quote:
Thanks so much for sharing.

And for the record...I was raised with dogs, always loved them. I will admit that the last year or so, I've been a bit tainted after having been bit by a loose dog while jogging, and now this. But, I know the owner is the real enemy here. However, if given the chance to do it all over, I would have shot at the dog if I caught it harming my flock. Animal Control said it's completely acceptable.

I'm not ignoring my part in this, either. I know now how vulnerable these birds are.

This same dog is barking, barking, barking all day long. (she's a bloodhound, by the way) I wish they'd at least take the dog away from him.