I have bigger problems now. Sunday morning (while was out of town) my son awoke to find a chocolate lab massacring my flock. In his effort to run and get a gun he tripped and broke two toes. He did manage get a pistol (my rifle was locked up because I was out of town) and even with two broken toes he was able to get a couple shots off and wound the dog. I had to drive 150 miles to get home to take care of my son and found 13 dead chickens, one of which was half a mile away down the road in the front yard of a another house. After thinking it over it guessed that there must have been more then one dog, the one who stayed and kept on killing and the one who carried that one rooster off down the road. I was not sure, but last night I caught video of two large dogs attacking one of my poultry pens on my trail cam. The two dogs belong to the house down the road where I found that one chicken. Now I am in a quandary about what to do. My relationship with my neighbors is very important to me and I do not want to jeopardize it. I could just wait for the dogs to come back, shoot them and bury the bodies and nobody would know the difference. But if it were my dogs doing this, I would appreciate it if I were given the chance to save their lives. But if I go down and show them the video proof of their what their dogs are doing and photos of the pile of dead chickens, they are bound to know that it was me that shot their other dog. Now if it were me, I would be completely understanding if a person shot my dog while he was killing their chickens. Heck, I have even terminated some my own dogs for chicken killing. But some people love their dogs more then their own children these days and who knows what they would do if they found out my son shot their dog.
This is a hard one because, if handled wrongly, it could create a life long feud with my neighbor and that can make life really miserable. People use to be really understanding of these things, but now day you never know.
