By the way, if anyone ever deliberately hurt or killed one of our dogs while it was on our property not causing them any true harm, they would quickly come to regret it. I hope you guys aren't actually serious about that kind of response...

What's "DINK"? thanks.SmileWavy

Double income no kids. BS bragging if you ask me.

Our neighbor had two dogs that were quite okay.... during the day, but at night... middle of the night, they would start barking and howling. Needless to say, this gets quite old after 1 night without sleep. We spoke with the owner about it, but he couldn't do much about it.

Since our bedroom was on the second floor and overlooking the dog yard just below our window, I had a bucket of water at the ready. When they started howling, I'd open the window and dump a gallon of water on them. After a couple of times, they stopped. Maybe they thought it was a message from the heavens, maybe a case of learned response and reinforcement at work. I think a hose and nozzle might have the equivalent effect.

Sherwood

i did not read the replies but,
my brother went a bought a bark coller for his neighbers dog, best $100 he ever spent!..quote

I bought one of these to stop some beagles from howling. It hasn't stopped them completely, but there has been a noticeable improvement. Plus, their owner gets to see what looks like a bird house facing his yard with a little flashing light on it.

I tried keeping a log of when/how long they howled, but the judge and the perp go to the same church and the case was basically thrown out.

I have fantasies about leaning over the fence and opening fire with my fully auto soft air gun. I can even get bio-degradable BBs for it, and it shoots at 350 fps, so I'm sure they'd feel it.

But I don't want to go to jail.

Keep us posted!

Cheers,

Paul.

I would say that in your case, you got lucky you didn't get arrested. I'm not into going off half-cocked, bad things can happen. Call me spineless for thinking things out. Whatever. You never know in this world who's psychotic enough to put a gun in your face.

Since I knew these were renters, I would try the "spineless bastard" way and have their landlord say something. Judging by their reaction, I decided that talking to them wasn't going to solve anything. See, the landlords have had other issues with them and their reaction was described as "offended and hostile". You just can't really effectively deal with that. Some people you just can't talk to, and threatening them is often far worse.

I'm no peaceknick hippy, but I'm not about to go to jail because of a dog.

Oh yea, almost forgot. I talked to one of the other neighbors this weekend about the dog and they had talked to the owners before I tried contact and they basically told the guy that they didn't care and they wouldn't keep the dog inside when they were gone. Nice folks eh?

You make a lot of assumptions, Seric. And an implication... No, I did not go off "half-cocked". Yes, I did think this through.

In my couple of conversations with these people, I arrived upon the same conclusion you did in your case - it was clear that speaking with them was not going to solve anything. They were the kind that just didn't give a rat's ass, and had the attitude that there was nothing I could do, so "STFU and go away..."

Like I said, their dog ran loose all the time. When they did chain him up to the house, at night, all he did was bark. That was far from the worst of the problem; the "general nuisance" part of running loose all day included property damage in addition to crapping in everyone else's yards. We had all had enough, and many of us had spoken with this neighbor. He was a blight on the neighborhood in many other ways, but that is a different story.

The cops (county cops) did come. A nice young deputy walked right up my driveway, where I was putting a new motor in my old FJ40 Landcruiser, and asked me If I had shot the dog. My answer was "absolutely. Is there some kind of problem with that?" His answer was that, well, no there wasn't. Because I was outside the city limits. Had I been inside the city limits, there would be a problem with discharging a firearm...

I protested that it wasn't a "firearm". He told me that, inside the city, even the BB gun I used would be considered a "firearm". "Oh goody, then - next time I can use my '06 and it wouldn't make any difference to you guys..." "Well, uh, no sir, then we might really have a problem. You can't just kill your neighbor's dog, no matter how much he needs it."

I thought you shot and killed the dog with a firearm. It sounded more definitive that way.

I can see that nailing the dog with a BB gun would teach it to stay off your property, but how did you get it to stop barking when it was back on its own property, and otherwise to stop being a nuisance?

Back to the OP, Atlanta has a noise ordinance.

http://www.nonoise.org/lawlib/cities/atlanta.htm

The following specific acts are declared to be in violation of this article:

5) Animals. The owning, possessing or harboring of any animal which frequently or continuously howls, barks, meows, squawks or makes other sounds which create excessive noise across a residential or commercial real property line or within a noise-sensitive area. For the purpose of this article, barking dogs shall include a dog that barks, bays, cries, howls or makes any other noise continuously for a period of ten minutes, or barks intermittently for one-half hour or more to the disturbance at any time of day or night regardless of whether the dog is physically situated in or upon private property.

And here

http://www.peachtreebattlealliance.org/id28.html

I have to think that if multiple neighbors are persistent, you will be able to get this dog impounded or his owners fined.

I have a German Sheppard that lives about 350/400 ft from my house and he barks all the F'ing time! My problem is that I'm the last house in the city limits and the owner lives in the county so I'm not sure if the county officials will do anything about it. I agree that it’s the owners that need to be flogged if they don't do anything but at three o'clock in the morning, all you are looking for is a target of opportunity!
I found the guy's phone number a few days ago so the next time his dog starts barking after 10 pm, I'm planning on calling him and asking "Could you go and check on your dog....". If he wants to be a jerk about it, then I'll have to rethink the best way to approach him........I don't respond well to ********* neighbors who don't take the responsibility of owning a dog seriously.

BTW...I thought "DINK" was the sound of a bullet when it hits the target????

I can't believe nobody has brought up air horns!

Every time the dog barks and your neighbors are home, blow the air horn. Don't stop until somebody comes out or the dog shuts up.

I would of course try talking to the owners first and use this only as a last resort.

them:"why the hell are you blowing that air horn?"

you:"why the hell is your dog barking?"

them:"thats what dogs do!"

you:"well this is what air horns do!"

I see a Steve Martin movie coming from this.

I can only imagine what the debates were like before the final wording of that statute was agreed upon.

Didn't assume that you did, if it sounded that way, my bad.

But either approach, and I've done them all in different situations, could yield different results. It's funny, when I was living in apartments, talking to the neighbor about their loud stereo or what not, never helped. It was only then when I filed a complaint with the office, that something was done. SOmetimes it took a few times. People are just jerks sometimes.

Reminds me. One of my ideas was to position a Shure SM-57 microphone on the side of the house where the dogs bark. Immediately adjacent would be a couple of Acoustic Research AR-3a speakers connected to my then, state-of-the-art Marantz 40 watt receiver with the volume cranked to the "hurt" level. These speakers would, of course, be aimed at the neighbor's house. Or I could have been more imaginative and set up a "bark sensor" to play Kubrick's 2001 movie theme, Also Sprach Zarathustra.

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Dogs prefer feedback, right?

In the end, the water dump was simpler and effective without resorting to audio hookups. Besides, the dogs might have liked the tune.

Sherwood

Here's my best barking dog story: I met a customer at their new house to discuss remodeling. We were in the driveway and there was an obnoxious dog right next to us on the other side of the fence. After a minute or so of asking , "Huh, wha'd you say?" I went to the garage, filled a bucket and dumped it over the fence it on the dog. I think I got the job because of my bold actions. ;)

I had to do it once again on another day and we never heard the dog again. At least when it picked up my scent.

This is how you handle it:


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Rofl...

Go get a dog whistle. Wait until after midnight or a later hour when your neighbor is sleeping. Blow the whistle every 5 or 10 minutes or so and get the dog going. Do this all night for several consecutive nights. You will lose some sleep but you will have a great time driving your neighbor and his dog nuts.