- Jan 27, 2011
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A little history: My husband and I have been keeping chickens in our neighborhood for nearly a year. We have a 1 acre, fenced in lot, and let the chickens free range during most days. At night the chickens get locked into their henhouse with an attached 20ft x 10ft covered run. It's like Fort Knox. Nothing can get in there (things have tried with no avail!). Aside from initial issues with a coon, things have been great with our chickens. 3 houses down from us lives a family with 2 dogs. One of the dogs is more of a gazelle/kangaroo hybrid than a dog - she can jump a fence with NO problem. Both dogs are spastic, out of control, and will not obey commands (because they are not taught to). Last summer their female began coming into our yard to visit. At the time we had rottweilers, one was in heat. Anyone who has had a dog in heat knows that the male partner can be pretty grouchy when his female is in heat. We were really afraid their female would be eaten by our male if he got protective of his territory. We contacted the dog's owner several times to come get his dog. It usually takes several calls or texts before getting a reply from him. Although he seems to avoid us, once we get a hold of him he always takes the dog home (after chasing her around the neighborhood for a while - she hops from one back yard to the next, she's all over the place). He's nice about it, but he just can't seem to keep her in their yard. Last fall they installed one of those invisible fence lines with the shock collars on the dogs. It works - sometimes. But when they don't put new batteries in their dogs' collars, the dogs get out. Both of them get out. The male seems to have learned how to get into our yard, too. Several times in the last few months their dogs have been out roaming the neighborhood. We've been cutting down how much we let the chickens free range because we don't want them to fall prey to this guy's dogs. Well, a few day ago the weather was so nice (we've been a bit cold and snowy on and off lately), and we hadn't seen the dogs out for a few days, so my husband let our chickens out in the yard. He was home, and in and out of the house doing yardwork and tinkering around with things, so he thought it would be safe. He went into the house for a little bit (about a half hour) and came back outside to a dead EE rooster and a dead wyandotte hen. The necks were chewed, but no scratches or anything like that. A friend of mine works part time for the gazelle/kangaroo dog owner. She called and asked him if his dogs were out because two of our chickens were killed that day. He said he didn't know because he wasn't home. He didn't go home to check, and when he got home that evening they were in the yard (they're crazy, but not dumb dogs. They know to be in the yard in the evenings when he gets home. They're usually out of their yard mid-day or morning when the owners aren't around). He never contacted us or anything. My husband and I decided that as long as those dogs are around, we'll just have to keep the chickens confined unless we are in the yard with them. If we go inside, the chickens have to go inside their house. Today my neighbor across the street called and asked me if my husband or I were home because she saw two dogs in our yard and wasn't sure if our chickens were out. I immediately called my husband. The chickens were put up, but the dogs were hovering around the coop looking like they wanted dinner. We tried calling and texting the dog owner, and like usual, he hasn't answered yet. My friend that works part time for him tried calling him, too. She heard back from him (but we still haven't). He said he didn't know they were getting out (big surprise dude. This isn't their first rodeo). He's currently trying to find them. But he has been avoiding calls and texts from us. We don't want to be bad neighbors or be jerks about anything, but I've just about had enough. Our yard is fenced in. We have a cat, dogs, and chickens as pets. Our animals are in our yard, and they don't roam around into neighbors' yards causing problems. I expect other pet owners to be as responsible with their animals. How do we handle this without coming off as the "bad guys" to this neighbor? We don't want any of our animals to be hurt (poisoned) over something like this. I would hate to call animal control over these dogs but I feel like if he didn't want it to happen he wouldn't let them keep getting out. I get the impression that they aren't really into having dogs. These dogs are so out of control, you can tell no one spends much attention on them. I feel like he should just be responsible and not have any pets if he doesn't have the time or patience to properly raise them. Anyway... any advice would be appreciated. It's been an ongoing issue and it has not improved. If anything, it has cost us 2 chickens. Something has to change. Has anyone else handled a similar situation? If I or my husband catch any animal in the act of attacking any of our pets on our property, that animal will be shot instantly. I'd hate for it to come to that, but we have to protect our pets when they're on our property. Thanks for listening
