HELP!! New Neighbor Problems

If you need a good coyote trapper who's willing to work within (his interpretation of ) the off-season trapping laws, pm me. He's in central ME and will sometimes trade trapping for pelts or meat.

My sympathies on your neighbor situation, and FWIW, I think you did the right thing filing the report--it'll serve as evidence if you do end up having more neighbor troubles.

Here in Maine you can shoot coyote all year long. The problem is we have so many. The packs here are at least 10 to a pack. Most of them are coydogs, and are not affraid of humans. When I see them I shoot them.

You have my sympathies too. We are blessed that all of our neighbors are not bothered by our animals. They never complain. In fact, our closest neighbors are the ones that built this house, raised their family in it and then built a small house next door and sold this one. They have told me several times how much they love seeing a growing family here and all of our animals. They even enjoy the crowing rooster! LOL!
Now, about 6 months ago we got new neighbors on one side of us. Oh dear.
I'm in Washington State, I think they might be from California or something. They knew we were a farm when we moved here. The once mentioned to the other neighbor about the pig smell. It was winter, wait till it warms up! Wait until they find out that we are buying the two fields that seperate them from us. Yikes!
We did have a priceless moment last week. Another neighbor's kids used to get onto my kids about crossing one of those fields. Saying we didn't own it. Bwhahaaaa.... They are going to really have their nose out of joint for a while...because..now we do!
Anyhow, my dogs bark, my goats are noisy, the roosters and chickens can make quite a noise and the pigs will squeel loudly some days.

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I think you did the right thing By going on record when your animals were threatened. The only thing I might do in addition is look up some methods of training your dogs to refuse found food, or treats from strangers. I've never worked with a trained LGD so you would have to find the appropriate method for your situation.

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i think you need to get some video of your neighbors banging at 0230 to get your dogs riled up. that video will solve any problem down the road. they are going out of their way to harass things in your yard, then complain about the resulting situation.

I feel for you. We live in town so there are ordinances about dogs running loose and such. If ours have been outdoors we have chanined them but our neighbors like to let theirs run loose. The only thing I would recommend would be to put a fence around your property and post no trespassing signs. I would also block their phone number from my phone so they couldn't call. There's no law against that. I think you're doing what you can to be neighborly and to get along, just keep at it. It will pay off eventually.

Huh, this looks like Homesteading Today. The colors are the same. The header is the same. But I must have wandered into City-Folk-Moving-to-Green-Acres or something. I can't believe there are people on the board giving a member a hard time about her LGDs doing their job, and her city-folk neighbors complaining about the noise. Moopups, are you really depending these city transplants? They moved next to a farm and now they're complaining about the noise? And you're on their side? Geesh.

Pyrnad, you have my sympathies.

Know what? I have never met ANYBODY who was at their best in the middle of the night. Your neighbors were cranky? Well, I am certain that YOU were as well. That tends to go hand in hand with being woken up in the middle of the night by calls OR barking dogs!

Tell me, how did you get along BEFORE the midnight phone call? Did they seem to be OK? IF so, it might not be too late to salvage a peace, of sorts.

Now that you are all awake, how about apologising for the dog barking, but that he is guarding the livestock? And, you would have LIKED to bring him in but then the coyotes would have killed a few goats?

And, if they say perhaps there is a QUIETER way to guard the critters, say that there is nothing that works very well?

City folk do NOT intuitively KNOW that LGD's must be outside to do their job. Last night they did NOT realize that you couldn't just bring the dog in, and if they were not pleased when they found out that you couldn't, well, NOBODY is at their best at 1 AM!


They are neighbors. You will see them every day. A truce is preferable.

And, good luck! They MIGHT be more reasonable now that the sun is up!

I have tons of coyotes around here... The odd thing is my dogs get really quiet and whiney LOL, Now mine are strictly utility dogs not pets. Their job is to bark when something gets TOO close. BUT... they are not necessarily guard dogs... All are drop off or pickups or unwanteds, except 2... The rest are just fortunate that I feed them. I have a neighbor who fires off bottle rockets in retaliation of my roosters. Personally I don't say anything I just raise more ROOSTERS LOL. This IS the country. I have also shot dogs that come and harass my animals or kill them either one. I lost an emu, an llama and a minature sheep to a pair of dogs. Neither dog wore a collar but I knew where they came from. I ended up shooting the one dogs, it came back for seconds. It was pregnant (oops :-|) his problem. BECAUSE he wouldn't pay for the dead animals which cost me plenty...

A lady I know I bought some rare and hard to find chicks from, was harrassed by some neighbors who put up a McMansion next door and complained to her about the stink and noise. She was grandfathered in to the bylaws as she had been there for over 15 years. He threatened to poison her birds. WHICH is very easy to do. I would be nearly impossible to trace because just about anything would kill a chicken! These fowl she had raised for years. And some of them were not cheap. So all around her these ppl have put up these huge homes and then bitch because she doesn't want to move. I did advise her.....

"Wait till they are all up and being lived in then when that LAST guy wants to buy your place ask a rediculious price for the place and relocate. Get an even bigger place with the money." I don't know if she will. Her response to the threat was to move out the rarest birds to some lifelong friends homes. I still haven't gotten my chicks only because of the harrassment of moving them had totally screwed with their laying and the ability to handle stress is hard on birds. So I am still waiting that was over a year ago...

It is wrong to hassel someone like that regardless. They were there first. The other person should suck it up and just join the community and get along. My neighbor has his place up for sale LOL...

Arklady

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"His word is in my heart like a fire, a fire shut up in my bones. I am weary of holding it in; indeed, I cannot." Jeremiah 20:9

I am defending sanity and common sense; suppose the neighbors choose to have rock or punk band practice at 2 am? More open minds here folks, an annoyance is an annoyance, reguardless of the source.

If jet aircraft was buzzing the sky at 2 am, and the critters responded, would it be the critters fault or the jet aircraft? Same with the coyotes, it is not the neighbor, it is not the LGDs, it is the coyotes. Prevent the problem - don't attack the response to the problem...

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If you can read this - thank a teacher. If you can read this in English - thank a veteran.

Never mistake kindness for weakness.

I wouldn't worry too much about the neighbor actually getting anywhere with the authorities; I highly doubt neighbor squabbles are high on their list of priorities.
Sounds like you just have lousy neighbors.
I wouldn't have any further contact with them, and I would turn my telephone ringer off at night and turn the answering machine on.
In the unfortunate event you have to talk to them again, suggest to them that they use white noise at night because your dogs are there to protect your animals.

moopups, you sound like a city folk. You are too harsh. Pyrnad is right IMO. These city folk that moved in can complain about dogs barking, chickens clucking, roosters crowing, horses neighing, children yelling, tractors going at 6 am, pigs smelling. If it ON my property than it is something they are going to have to deal with. I am well within my rights and it was this way BEFORE they moved in. They did not move to the city they moved to a place where it is legal to have these 'nuisance'. It is the treat that would make me spitting mad! If you want city, stay in the city. If you want country, YOU are the one that needs to adapt.

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"If we ever forget that we're one nation under GOD, then we will be a nation gone under." - R Reagan

History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. ~ D D Eisenhower

I understand how you feel. My college professor neighbor from hell and I got into a scrap over my dogs. After his dogs, which ran all over the neighborhood, killed several hundred dollars worth of my pheasants, he denied it was his dogs, etc. I put chain link fence around the yard and pheasant pens and just let it go and didn't say any more about it. Then he had the gall to call me one day and tell me that my dogs had to go, even though they were inside the fence on my place. Seems they barked when his wife, daughter, and pack of mutts went to the mail box, which is directly across the road from my yard, and scared his little girl. By now I was pretty steamed, told him the only reason they barked was his daughter was so damned ugly she scared my poor dogs. The conversation sort of went down hill from there. He informed me that he had a gun, I replied that I had several,knew how to use them, and was probably a better shot. I told him if he was stupid enough to shoot one of my dogs I couldn't prevent it, but he had better shoot all he wanted to shoot the first time, because I would make sure he didn't make a habit of it. He demanded to know "what's that supposed to mean"? Your the bright boy college professor, you figure it out. I guess he did, he hasn't shot any dogs yet. Not much worse than a pain in the rear neighbor.

THat would be against the law.

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"If we ever forget that we're one nation under GOD, then we will be a nation gone under." - R Reagan

History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. ~ D D Eisenhower

And just how is she supposed to prevent a coyote problem?? Sit out 24 hours a day & shoot them all?? The dog is doing it's job. The neighbors need to buy some ear plugs if they don't like it. I have already said if I had a neighbor move in & start complaining about my goats, I would move the stinkiest buck right near their house.

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I can't believe I deleted it!

Hey Pyrnad;

Ya know what works real good... hmmmm?????

Clean out the barn and barnyard on a real warm day... You do know that composting is a permissable way of disposing of bedding etc. in Maine... that's what I do. Pile it as close to the property line as possible. Did you know that barn flies will travel up to 1/4 mile.

I have neighbors from Hell as well... actually they're M-------s but to me same difference. They show up many weekends over the summer and bring their dogs and ATV and guns... Running up and down my road day and night. I call the Sheriff.. the State Police... The Game Warden... the Dog Warden.. I've chased their mutts out of my yard and followed them to their house where I informed their owners in NO UNCERTAIN TERMS that if their dogs were trespassing again they'd be SOS (shot on sight).

Of course it becomes a never ending battle ( going on here over three years) but DON'T give in. You have every right to farm! It's really ashame that Maine is losing it's small agriculture but it's things like this that are causing it.

Everytime, I REPEAT, everytime they harass your dogs to make them bark CALL THE PD!!!! It works... after awhile they'll get the message or sell their place.

P.S. How's Streak settling in?

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Ken In Maine
www.goatschool.com

I spoke with the animal control officer. He notified them of the law about LGD's and that they knew their was a farm here(my barn is 20 feet from their dwelling). He will not answer complaints about barking dogs at my address. I am within the law, and I have no control over the coyote or bear in the area.
Chief of police stopped to see me before going next door. He told me she was screaming at him on the phone and hung up on him. He was going to give her a copy of the law, and the federal right to farm act. He also told me he was going to inform them that they are to make no more calls to me in the middle of the night. They were aware that a farm was here when the bought, and farms make niose.

Send them ear plugs. Even if you are within the law, you do realize how annoying your dogs are to neighbors trying to sleep, don't you?

I can't imagine anyone moving into a house 20 feet from somebody elses barn (on a farm) and then having a problem with farm noises. No sympathy here.

Moopups, Your example of a rock band practice at 2am is a poor one. The analogy to that would be someone keeping a cow in their apartment in Manhattan. When you move to the country you should expect farm noises...and I include guard dogs protecting their animal herds as part of that. You don't expect rock bands. If I moved into loft condos in a trendy city area and the people living around me were all musicians...well, I'd kind of expect them to practice. Personally, I wouldn't move into a situation like that.

Final point, as with other threads where somebody threatens to do something on somebody elses property. Not very smart and a good way to get shot (if the first party is actually foolish enough to go on the property of the part of the second party.

As usual, just my 2 cents.

Mike

I agree with this. Wish you could shoot the neighbors to.

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