So upset - neighbour problems and alarm barking UPDATED

[LouiseH]

 

I've resisted posting on here for so long, but am so upset today that I have to ask for some support. I have 2 cockers (yes just 2) and my neighbours have complained 3 times about barking. Each time it has been different dogs (we have lived here for 3 years and as a breeder I have had 3 different dogs over the last 3 years).

Each time has been a separate complaint.

1 - dog barking when I was at work, I now work from home so hardly ever go out - problem solved
2 - dog barking when let out for a wee at 7am and 10pm - I started letting them out the patio door one at a time - problem solved
3 - This morning my 2 girls were in the garden playing at 8.20am, Jenna was barking at Cleo playfully. My neighbour leaned out of his bedroom window and started having a go, saying it was getting downright annoying 

I didn't know what to say. I hate confrontation and previously we have always backed down, going round to apologise etc but this really hit me because I just don't know how to solve the problem, in fact I strongly believe they are being unreasonable.

Cleo alarm barks at everything, wheelie bins are worst, then people walking past, cars on neighbours driveways (we live in a quiet cul-de-sac) people talking, and every time my other neighbour takes their GSD out through the back gate and I can see how this could be annoying but surely it is not unreasonable for dogs to bark as an alarm?

My dogs are hardly ever left alone, but as I am a Childminder they are restricted to the side of the house as my rear garden is used by the children.

The same neighbours have also complained to my other neighbour about their dog barking too.

Just don't know what to do 

[silly milly]

i feel for you.    my 2 also alarm bark at everything - including during the night.

we find it annoying sometimes, so i can only imagine what the neighbours think!

i really dont have an answer, except to say that i prefer them to warn me if something untoward is happening, or if someone is at the door.

i really dont think its too unreasonable to have a dog that alerts us to "intruders" - its just a case of getting used to it, and of course, not ignoring the barking but checking it out and then calming the dogs down as quickly as possible.

i will be intersted in others points of view!   

[louis mum]

Louis how horrible your neighbour has made you feel like this  From your description my two are 10 times worse, particularly 'alarm' barking. TBH I dont correct mine for it unless it becomes prolonged, and all I do is bring them inside. I defo think your neighbour is being unreasonable  I am lucky with my neighbours I think, plus the fact over the close lives a police man with two dogs that live outside and bark constantly  and I mean right through the night. His resolve was to give then squeeky toys to occupy them  so at 4am you can hear a pig squeeking   

I dont think you are the problem, it sounds like your neighbour is being unreasonable. Cleo and Jenna are only a babas arnt they  I would try to dismiss your plonker neighbour, as long as the barking isnt continuous throughout the day/night I would ignore him. Easy said I know 

[GillSarge]

I dont think you are the problem, it sounds like your neighbour is being unreasonable. Cleo and Jenna are only a babas arnt they  I would try to dismiss your plonker neighbour, as long as the barking isnt continuous throughout the day/night I would ignore him. Easy said I know 

I agree, I would ignore this person, and if he does come to your door to complain, just say your in your right by law regarding noise making! it's not unreasonable, and not all day and night.  It just sounds like you have a neighbour who doens't like dogs!  We live in an area where everyone seems to own a dog, even next door, she quite often will say she tells her dog off for barking when she realizes he's not! and i will reply back, yes I heard a dog barking too, but it wasn't our, as I know she's accusing our dogs of barking! She's a bit odd though!

[emderpenguin]

I totally sympathise, seeing as I got a letter from the council the other day about our dogs barking! but the letter for ours says in the evenings/at night (which I find odd, seeing as I'm at work all day and would think that would be when they did it more.

Seeing as I have a german shep who is constantly 'on watch' and WANT him to be it's prooving very difficult to manage.

No real advise as such. I'm keeping a written record of when my dogs bark (and when it's the neighbours) and have taken to shutting Kye in the back room at night, instead of letting him have free roam (pepper sleeps with us anyway). That way I do at least have something if the council take the complaint further (not even sure it IS my dog at night, but there you go)

the whole thing has made me feel very uncomfortable in my own home though. I'm constantly on edge, waiting for the next 'thing' (dog/cat walking passed, car, people walking passed, one of the MANY neighbours dogs barking, one of the MILLION of take-away leaflets being pushed through our letter box.. ) to set him off

[bella15]

I dont think you are the problem, it sounds like your neighbour is being unreasonable. Cleo and Jenna are only a babas arnt they  I would try to dismiss your plonker neighbour, as long as the barking isnt continuous throughout the day/night I would ignore him. Easy said I know 

I agree, I would ignore this person, and if he does come to your door to complain, just say your in your right by law regarding noise making! it's not unreasonable, and not all day and night.  It just sounds like you have a neighbour who doens't like dogs!  We live in an area where everyone seems to own a dog, even next door, she quite often will say she tells her dog off for barking when she realizes he's not! and i will reply back, yes I heard a dog barking too, but it wasn't our, as I know she's accusing our dogs of barking! She's a bit odd though!

I have the same problem here with barking having 5 dogs but everyone along where Ilive has  at least one or two dogs -so you sometimes do not know what dog it is.Our neighbour always has a go at me about mine howling when the phone rings  - his wife says ignore him which I do any way because their three dachunds are worse then my five but I never complain - their dogs also know when I am letting mine out and start as soon as I go to open the patio door - for little dogs theyare very noisy 

[Jane S]

This kind of situation is really difficult and stressful but to be honest, I wouldn't ignore it as it could escalate and before you know it, you could be on the receiving end of a complaint. I would actually get in first and seek the advice of the Environmental Health Dept for your Local Authority (who are responsible for monitoring noise nuisance complaints). They do offer advice as well as deal with complaints. If you can show that you're being pro-active and seeking advice on what is reasonable and what isn't, it will help if your neighbours takes things further.

I'd also maybe see if there is anything that can be done to reduce the alarm barking. Your neighbour may well be a grumpy git who is over-sensitive to dogs barking any time of the day but at the same time, alarm barking can be annoying - there's a little schnauzer near us who barks at every little thing and it narks me sometimes so can well imagine it would be ten times worse for someone who perhaps dislikes dogs. Perhaps you could seek the advice of a decent behaviourist for some ideas on how to manage/reduce the alarm barking? Again this would hold you in good stead in case things get worse with your neighbour.

Sorry to go against the flow here but I know how complaining neighbours can make peoples' lives a misery and seen too many cases escalate to say ignore it

[speedyjaney]

I would begin making recordings of the barking so you have evidence.

We have had similar issues with our neighbours as ours bark every time we let them out, even if we let them out one by one and on-lead !!

We spoke to the Enviromental Health department and explained that our neighbours were becoming less tolerant and had threatened to complain. They sent an officer round who listened to the barking we had recorded a,d saw 1st hand what noise the dogs made and said it was well within acceptable....He was very realistic and advised us to not them out after midnight or before 5am....

[cazza shearer]

In the UK I had an awful neighbour , she got three other neighbours to complain about my dogs too. the problem was that she didnt go to work during the day . Normally neighbours dont mind as most work and are out all day .

Dogs will be dogs like kids will be kids ..............what you need to do is hire 4 teenagers , stick them outside in your garden with loud music , a load of beer and a large search light so when it gets dark they can at least see to open the beer and make their all important phone calls . See how she likes that . Hours and hours of kids verses 2 mins of dog barking .

I think because we have gone so PC in the UK , people tink they can complain about everything and everybody . Nosey people should get there own house in order . You want to start making a dairy of things she gets up to!!!!!

CJ

[GillSarge]

Actually agree with JaneS and others about getting the Environmental agency in to monitor the barking, coz if there is no cause for complaint then they will tell the neighbour you have not breached any rights, and basically mind your own business.  My parents neighbours did this, accept she complained about a pond fountain!  she was told to get on with her own life, and stop interfearing with my parents lives.  Also the next door neighboughs dog guard barks, and if I know they aren't in, I always speak to Darcy, to let him know to settle down, which he does straight away, my dogs don't ever bark back.  they are in fact very quiet dogs in general.

[sharonmansfield]

Its your neighbour who has the problem not you, some people have very sad boring lives and the only way they can make them better is to have a go at someone else. I am lucky, my dogs bark but my neighbours have dogs too and they sometimes bark to each other and we end up laughing when they wont shut up. Its like a conversation over the fence for them!!!
I really feel for you as you have been made to feel so bad for playing with your dogs in your own garden.
I dont have a solution sorry just sympathy. stupid people.

[LouiseH]

Thanks for all your support and advice. I have owned dogs all my life and lived in 3 houses but have never had neighbours like this. Thankfully we have been nicey nice since the start and this has won them over until now  We even let them have their flippin virgin cable put across our driveway so they didn't have to dig up their drive 

I do think the alarm barking with Cleo is bad, but I am always straight out to bring them in. We have a large grass section fenced off where I have had more grass seed put down to extend the lawn so hopefully in a few weeks they can go and play down there. This will stop the alarm barking as Cleo will be more occupied playing, but then Jenna starts as she doesn't bark at all unless playing with other dogs 

I have emailed the council for some help.

One of my annoyances is that they are both self employed. He is a gardener and comes and goes all day long with his trailer. She works from home as a seamstress so has clients coming and going all day long  Neither helps with the alarm barking!

One thing that bugs me is I know she is doing her job alerting me to a possible intruder and I just hate to expect dogs to be anything other than dogs...

I have kept them inside all day and it's really getting to me. The more I keep them in the more wound up they get. They have had supervised toilet trips and are now playing in the kitchen although I daren't give them any toys as it will start Jenna off barking.

The man stated this morning it is always when I am in, they don't bark at all when I am out - this is because they go in their big crate together when I have to go out and they sleep until I get back. He also said it is never at night so I am struggling to see what the problem is.

I have been thinking about it all day and wondered if he would be willing to come to an agreement on set times when they can play outside....but it all seems a bit extreme.

I'll report back with the environmental health info but I deffo think this is the way to go. Thanks guys - got 2 weekends of shows planned which should keep us all out the house 

[Cob-Web]

Louise - we have a similar problem, although our charming neighbour yells at the dogs to "shut the f*** up" if they make even the slightest sound when she is in the garden or has her windows open 

We had an idea that there may be a problem when we mentioned to her that we were getting a puppy before we got Molo, and her first words were "if it barks, I'll call environmental health"    She never has made a formal complaint though (her own behaviour is so appauling that she probably doesn't want to attract the attention of the authorities) but her continual sniping and abuse really upset me, and when her 14 year old daughter began to behave in the same way, it really did begin to affect my quality of life 

In previous summers, I have been a wreck - paranoid about every little noise the dogs made, ensuring that early morning and last-thing-at-night trips to the garden were supervised and never leaving the back door open even on the hottest of days.  If they barked while I was upstairs, I'd have a go at my OH for allowing them to bark, and I generally got myself into a right tizz about it 

It was only when the neighbour the other side told me that she had noticed how stressed I was, and that I needed to pull myself together, that I took a deep breath and got things back in perspective.  I still try to ensure that noise is kept to a minimum before 9 am and after 8 pm in the evening, and I will intervene if their play-barking gets out of control, but I now allow them to romp in the garden and if they yap once or twice, I don't stop them straight away.  I have also introduced an "enough" command, so that if they alarm bark, then I can stop them (I refuse to train them not to do it at all because like you, I want them to alert me to people approaching the house etc).  I know that if she ever does complain to Env Health, then my dogs are not unreasonably noisy - in fact, there are several in the neighbourhood which are far worse and even get on my nerves    I managed to view the situation more rationally, and come to terms with the fact that no matter what she thought of me or my pets, my quality of life was not going to be affected by her. I know its hard, and can take time to achieve, but it is well worth it so that you begin to enjoy your home with your dogs once again x

[LouiseH]

Thanks cob-web, just spoke to hubby on the phone and he's on his way home to do some long awaited DIY 

I've kept on about needing my new hanging basket brackets up for ages 

[Mudmagnets]

Like Cobweb's the first words I heard out of my new neighbours mouth was one Christmas morning and I was looking after and playing with the dog downstairs, whose dad had gone on holiday. "Shut the Flipp'n (not the word he used as you can imagine)dog up" It was 11am!!

Apparently he moved onto a busy main road, with fire/ambulance station nearly next door - for a bit of peace?? There was also a Doberman living in the next door flat (he knew about the dogs when he moved in as it was an exchange with a mate)

I appreciate that noisy dogs can be a problem, but I also sometimes think that neighbours feel they can bully the owners into submission, by threatening them with Environmental Health (Noise Nuisance)