We live across the street from a Dad and two boys, the youngest being 17. We thought they were great at first because they always kept their dog chained whenever they weren't around to supervise her. She constantly barked and they said it was because of rabbits running around the neighborhood and told us they were just going to start letting their dog run loose and oh well if their dog kills the rabbits. Their dog barks at everything to grace Earth! The people themselves have even tried to kill the rabbits. The rabbits are ones people decide they don't want and throw out of their house so we try to protect them. We were able to catch all of them except 2 and we hope to catch the other two before they kill them, but right now we have no place to put them because we haven't even found homes for the ones we have already rescued. They were all caught about four months ago and no place will take them (there's a total of 10 to 15 and everybody only takes cats and dogs). Meanwhile, the neighbors decided to let their lab run loose. She would be a great dog if they would train her, but she has a few major problems. She chases after bicycles, children, motorcycles, 4- wheelers, cars and trucks, rabbits, and more. She also comes into our yard or right in front of it next to our fence. In between their house and ours is a road and a little bit of grass right outside of our fence. There dog will go right up to our fence, especially if she sees cats or rabbits in our yard, though sometimes she will go despite nothing being in our yard. I can't even let my cats go to the edge of our fence within it, for fear that their dog will chase our cats and there will be problems through the fence. Today one of the boys was standing on the front porch and their dog was right at our fence on the grass in front of it. This time we didn't have any cats or rabbits in the front yard. I went outside and yelled "go home, get, go home" and clapped my hands. The person on the front porch, who was talking on the telephone, went to the back porch, probably so he could continue talking without the noise of me yelling at HIS dog. Now if you want to know flaming p****d! Finally, I successfully chased their dog away from our fence and it went in front of the other neighbor's yard (the dog does not listen worth a crap and just stares instead of runs away). I know if we do anything mean to their dog they are going to try even harder to kill the rabbits, but at this point enough is enough. While I don't want those rabbits to die, I'm tired of them letting their dog do anything and pretending like it's not theirs. We just got some sort of animal shelter within about the last year, all staff is paid and not volunteer. We have made numerous complaints about all of the problems with dogs out here and they just say they're too understaffed and if we catch the dogs we can bring them into them. They are nuts if they think we're going to try to catch other people's dogs! That's way too risky legally and safety wise, not to mention the trouble of trying to catch them and transport them. Today I chased off four different dogs, for a total of three or four times. First, the neighbor's dog and a dog a friend of theirs just left running around with the neighbor's dog, then later the neighbor's dog again (both times they were outside of our fence on the grass next to the road), and then again a Husky and a black dog that I'm not sure who's it was due to how dark it was outside (the other two dogs are black, but I don't know if this was either of them). The last two were in the part of our yard that is not fenced and if I had to guess they were trying to catch rabbits because the reason I heard them was because I heard something hit our fence (probably one of them trying to jump over it) and then I saw them in the area where the two loose rabbits sometimes hang out.

So anyways, my issue is what is the most humane thing to do to get these dogs to never even think of going next to our property again. My parents shoot a lot of dogs with rocksalt, though we have not done this to the neighbor's dog yet because we have been trying to be nice, and it was even mentioned that maybe I should shoot the dogs with blanks, but I really would rather not shoot dogs. I have watched other people throw rocks at the neighbor's dog and she just thinks it's a game. I have also thought about dog mace, but this also seems a bit harsh and possibly difficult due to how close one must be to use it. I learned about dog whistles tonight, but everything I read said that it is a training utensil and if the dog is not trained with it they just look like "whatever" and keep doing whatever they're doing. Any suggestions on what on earth to do because I have had enough of it. My stepdad said he wants to shoot rocksalt into a tree close to the dog so maybe the people will start caring, but he works a lot so who knows if that will ever happen. I'm just tired of being stressed and having to take care of other people's dogs by telling the dogs where they don't belong.

Get some of that Keep Off spray for dogs. I'm not sure what other humane thing you can do. Are the rabbits you've caught in cages?

Spray isn't really a feasible option for us because it has to be applied every day, is costly, and probably wouldn't work too well due to the large amounts of rain and snow we get. I'm not too sure when the last day was we haven't seen rain and by October we should have snow. I'm thinking about getting a dog whistle and trying it. Basically, I'll inadvertently be teaching their dog to stay away from our fence and property and other people's dogs also. I'm a little concerned about if the rabbits can hear the same frequency because if so, that's definitely not going to work. I figure if I blow the whistle and every rabbit on our property starts thumping then I know it is definitely within their frequency and I will have to figure something else out.

The rabbits are kept in a fenced-in closure within our fenced yard as far back as possible, but this is still completely visible to all. Some of the rabbits are housed in a tarp building in cages and these ones are let out for exercise, one by one, periodically in our front fenced yard while we are home. The rabbits in the building are ones we keep. Four of them were rescued quite a few years ago and two of them were rescued last year I think. We ended up rescuing a total of 14 rabbits from the neighbors and their dog though and of course there are still two more out. We can't keep all of those 14 because we just don't have the room, but unfortunately no place around here will take them so we are still working out homes for all of the babies. We might keep the adults. We are definitely keeping one that is loose because he's the oldest rabbit of all, the father of the four we caught several years ago. We thought he had gotten killed because he and a son disappeared around the same time we found the body of the woman he was with. After six months or a year he reappeared again. We have a good-sized property, but only so many can fit in a tarp building and to take on 14 more is just too much.

Unfortunately, that lab next to us has a never-ending fascination and lack of discipline so she comes over to our yard for them sometimes and other times she will just wander around the different properties trying to find something to do. She doesn't get near enough playtime. :( Sometimes she will completely ignore vehicles and other times she will chase after them and I think one of the major factors depends on if she has had enough playtime or not and it's very rare that she does get enough. I feel for the dog, but she is trouble to our animals so I have to consider them too.

You can get a pet electric fence - and electric wire like used for livestock but less electricity - and string it around your property. They won't touch it more than a couple of times to get the message. You can do it very cheaply - for cheapest stuff look at local livestock/farm supply store.
It will, however, also shock children.
Dog whistle will not work - the dog has to be trained to obey it, it doesn't just automatically scare them away, LOL.

Sounds like you should rehome most of the rabbits if not all.

This post should probably be moved to another forum...Or??

IMO? Tell the owner it bothers you. They sound like my neighbors, so they probably won't do anything regardless of what you say.
If the dog sets foot on your property, catch the dog and take it into the shelter. People like that don't deserve pets. They'll probably go pick the dog up, but they'll have to pay to get it back. Maybe they will keep a closer eye on it after that. If they don't get the dog, see to it that it is adopted. Here, if you turn in a dog, you can be put down as its safety net so that it's not put to sleep. Perhaps it would be better off with a different family. It puts a lot of work on you, I know. But if it seems like a decent enough dog that just has an unfortunate family....it might be worth it.

BUT...I have been told I'm far to heartless when it comes to these matters so maybe you shouldn't listen to me!! I wouldn't suggest shooting the dog, however. It's not the dog's fault that its owners are idiots.

I see that you mentioned you do not want to catch the dogs. If someone doesn't, they will probably continue to wander around until someone else shoots them or they are run over by cars or goodness knows what else. But I guess there's not much you can do if you don't want to catch them and animal control doesn't care.

When you're home and a dog wanders on to your yard, make a sudden loud noise and see if it scares them. To keep annie off the christmas tree, we put some pennies inside an aluminum pop can and taped the top shut. When she started in on the bad behavior, we shook it hard and loudly said "NO!!!". It scared the pants off of her and she never went near it again. Just a suggestion.

good luck with whatever you choose to do.

We actually thought about an electric fence, but were never able to figure out how to do without zapping children and rabbits.

I'm not too sure why you say to get all of the rabbits new homes, but some of these rabbits are pets that we love very much. We are only getting rid of the babies because we don't have room for nine more.

If I posted this under the wrong section I'm sorry. My thinking was that the dog lacked obedience so that was how I chose the category.

Due to today's events, I need to stay away from the dog and anytime it's in our yard I'm supposed to go get one of my parents. They're much better at chasing dogs away. Today the dog chased two girls on bicycles. She bit one of the girls tires so the girl lightly kicked the dog, trying to get away. Both girls went down the road screaming and couldn't lose the dog so they came back up the road and cut through some apartments to get away. Later the girls came back up and down the road, but the dog was inside. I also watched the dog almost get hit by a car today. :( I think she ran out in front of it. Another driver also was angered by the dog and trying to lose her. The people never even came out when the dog was barking and the girls were screaming. If I knew their address, I would send them information on how to train a dog. Unfortunately, everyone here uses P.O. Boxes and no last names are known. I'm going to keep watching for a few days and if it keeps going like this I'm going to see if maybe we can try contacting the society, in case maybe they are not understaffed. I think if we shared what the dog was doing, they would realize it to be a threat and do something.

I once told the neighbor's son to keep the dog out of our yard or my stepdad would shoot it (with rock salt, though I didn't say that part) because that's what everyone does around here does to problem animals, except they use real bullets. I don't think it's right for animals to suffer because of stupid people, but most people don't see it that way here. The son's response was that he doesn't care because it's not his dog. I just figured it was his because he spent time with it, but apparently it must belong to the father or brother. We have no plans to do anything to her right now, but watch her. We have never shot her because we like her... well at least we liked her until she kept going downhill. The few times they have caught their dog chasing something the Dad, in a praising tone calls the dog a bad girl. ha. I guess he didn't learn that dogs know tone. The boys, instead, will tell her to come and then smack her and firmly tell her "bad dog", which unfortunately is bad if you want your dog to keep coming to you, as I'm sure most of you know. They know their dog has a problem because every time one of them wants to leave they have to have someone else hold the dog so they can leave without her. Anyways, like I said, I'll give it a few days and see what happens. If the next few days are as bad as this one then maybe I'll see if Tuesday we can contact the shelter (they won't be open until Tuesday). I just keep hoping things will get better.