Predators and the Moral Dilemma

[ellieroo]

Quote:
Those kind of bulls can be serious predators. did you shoot it? Note that pellet guns aren't very effective on bulls.

No, but you won't believe what else happened. I really hate progress. I hunted on that land for along time. Well, when I left my only out was to move out to our family farm which has been in the family for 60 years. I'm an outdoors person. Well, here I am at the farm no neighbors peace & quiet life is great. Three months after moving to the farm I am woken up by more bulldozers. Yup, their putting a fricking neighborhood right next to my farm. I'm livid I can't believe some idiot is ruining the once most beautiful land in the world to build a neighborhood. I have no idea what I'm gonna do I'm not getting any younger & I can't keep moving & rebuilding .

I so know how you feel! We came out here for peace and quiet, lots of wildlife, passed no one on the road in or out 14 yrs later we are a neighborhood !

 

[frostbite]

The best way to ensure that you don't get neighbors is to buy up enough land to have the size buffer you want. Guy bought a 2 acre lot in a cul de sac in a new subdivision, then whenever anyone bought and adjacent lot, he terrorized them, because he didn't want them invading "his" private cul de sac. Not appropriate. He finally did move out, farther from town. Hope he bought a huge lot.

Apartment/Hotel was at the edge of an expanse of woods and an abandoned gravel pit pond. When it looked like development was going to encroach, they bought the woods and the gravel pit and turned it into a bird sanctuary, with nice handicapped accessible paths and viewing stations, and remodeled the gravel pit to provide shallows for wading birds. Now it's a blessing for their guests, and for the community.

Property rights are what they are, whether we like it or not. Sorry about the bulldozers, but I don't know that there's anything we can do about 'em. Short of buying the land out from under them.

 

[kgdubois]

After my most recent experience (the loss of nine birds in one afternoon) I'll now be shooting to kill...well, I'll have my husband do the shooting for me. Not because I have a problem with killing the dog, but because he's a much better shot, and I want the animal dead right away, not suffering. I would feel very bad if I didn't hit it correctly, and it suffered for longer than necessary.

The neighbor who has the dog that's been in my birds has been warned, and that dog WILL be dead if it gets in one more time.

I am pretty sure I'll feel bad, but only because the owner of the dog has made a situation where the dog must be dispatched. I can say with absolute certainty that the way I felt when I discovered nine partially eaten chicken carcasses was horrible, and I doubt shooting a dog will feel any worse than that. I felt sick, with guilt because those birds relied on me to protect them, and even though I did everything I could, they still got killed. I had three chances to get rid of that dog before he killed them, but I chose to try to work with the neighbor, and it resulted in the death of my birds. This WILL NOT be happening again.

On a side note, we just moved to Far West TX from Austin about two years ago...I wanted to have birds there, but my subdivision didn't allow them.

 

[CarolJ]

We had two beagles come up on our property a few days ago. They were very skittish - had collars on but wouldn't let us get near to catch them to see who they belonged to. They were obviously very hungry. We live out in the country on a farm. They were nosing around the chickens and generally being a pain getting into everything. My son finally caught one of them, put him in an animal carrier, and we got the name/number of the owner. We don't know him, but he lives about a mile away. We called him and he came to get the dogs. We had a friendly conversation. But then when he went to put the dogs in his car, he held them up off the ground by their collars and then backhanded them really hard when he put them in the cages in his car. We were all shocked and didn't know what to say or do. And of course he was on his way home immediately after that. They were his dogs, but now we understand why they ran away. My husband said that if the dogs ever show up here again, we won't be calling the owner.

 

[OldGuy43]

UPDATE: The dog has not been restrained. Saw him running free about 15 minutes ago. Since he didn't come anywhere near my homestead I let him be. The 12 ga. is next to the door and loaded with 00 however.

 

[Chic-n-farmer]

It's always the same old story. The dog pays for the owner's ignorance. I killed a dog last month, a beautiful young malamute.

The owner knew/admitted it had killed chickens and our peahen, but kept letting the dog run, after promising to keep him home.

I caught the dog in the act of attacking my pygmy goat-who-thinks-he's-a-lap-dog. I shot the dog. The owner is very mad. Say's he'll sue me, made a lot of threats. He accepts no responsibility in not protecting his dog.

It's hard to live with shooting dogs that could be good pets if they had decent owners. Sometimes it comes down to my animals, or the neighbor's and you don't see my animals going on to their property to die...

Do what you have to do. You'll get through the sorrow it causes you.

 

[Nausicaa]

Better to have the deterrant and means of protection. Take it from me, I still haven't purchased my gun so I have had the joy of hauling dogs off my property to the nearby rescue. I live way out in the middle of no-wheres. People drive out from the city to dump their unwanted dogs in the desert. So every so often they wander my way, completely starved and with a total loss of trust and loyalty to humans. These are much more dangerous than any coyotes or fox I have ever encoutered. I have spoken to the animal control and they promise if I can contain the dogs then they will make the trip out to come pick them up. I would rather have a gun. It can be very dangerous coming between a dog that does not know you and does not respect you.

You have to look at it this way also, if your neighbors do not listen when you say that you have to protect your own livestock, then remind them that dogs ARE DANGEROUS. There is a reason that dogs can and are considered weapons. It doesn't matter if it is a pit bull or a terrier. If their dog is on your property it does not matter if the dog is sweet and loving in their home, it can still attack you.

I've had neighbors who have had small cute dogs bite and draw blood for them horses, another neighbor lost her entire herd of sheep to a group of wild hungry dogs, not coyotes, but dumped city dogs.


I'm a major dog lover but I have been fed up from my own experiences. I don't think people give dogs the respect that they deserve, dogs are loyal, sweet, warm and furry but they are predators, always.

 

[aprophet]

It don't register it IS an animal; not a person when something takes food from me it does it only once I trap hard during trapping season I do not see preds all summer my flock is to feed me not preds HTH

 

[darkmatter]

Quote:
Do the SSS. I admitted to a neighbor that it was I who shot one of his dogs when the whole pack of 6 was killing my flock (the rest ran off) and he called the sheriff and came out to my property with the sheriff and a big swagger to correct the incident. The sheriff looked at the evidence, confirmed the dog was on my property, and then turned to the neighbor and told him he was responsible for the livestock value. The neighbor's swagger visibly deflated and he slunk off back to his cityslicker fantasy life.
That cityslicker idiot still allowed his dogs to pack up and roam the countryside, I and other livestock owners gradually eliminated them with the SSS method even as he bought more to replace his lost pets. He eventually moved away due to overextended finances and foreclosure.
This happened years ago and the cityslicker dog pack problem recurs on an annual basis.

 

[chickened]

If I lived where I could not use a real gun I would use a pellet gun. A good friend of my parents was having trouble with a cat killing her chicks in her yard, she would turn them out and within a couple hours the cat would show up and either stalk them or get one. The city said they do not control feral cats, I loaned her my pellet gun she shot the cat in the gut or so she said and never seen it again. She loved animals but loved her chickens more.