So how do we handle this?

Emily

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#1
Ok, so here's the deal. We have these neighbors on one side that had a history of hostility (undeserved) towards our landlords, who used to live where I live now. I can explain if you want to hear it, but just rest assured that their hostility is completely ridiculous and undeserved.

Fast forward, our landlords moved out, we moved in. We've never had any interaction with these neighbors whatsoever. Last year, I came into the yard to find several lumps of raw ground beef in the center of the backyard. I picked them up before the dogs could eat them and threw them out. A little while later, I found fish filets, again, in our yard. Threw them out. Then pizza crust. Then cheese. Then hot dogs.

Recently, I saw them pour water (or something) out their kitchen window. More recently, there are splashes of what looks like pancake batter on the outside of our kitchen window. Understand that I live in the city, so the gap between our houses is slightly wider than a sidewalk, and our kitchen windows just about line up. Also beneath their kitchen window (on our property), we just found a pile of polenta(?) and two peeled, hard-boiled eggs.

The final offense is that they came into our yard to repost their fence - which would have been fine, but they left the gate to our back alley OPEN. I was away with both dogs at the time (luckily!), so it's possible they did try to knock and ask if they could enter the yard, although I doubt it. If I had been home and had the dogs out, and they entered the yard, I can promise they would have been charged, and possibly body slammed and bitten. Keeva is a territorial little pill when people enter uninvited, and my roommate's dog is a 75 lb GSD mix who's extremely hostile to men who let themselves in. My point is, do NOT come into my yard without asking. Ever.

Now, the food thing... I think that the beef, fish, cheese, hot dogs, were only meant as treats for the dogs. The father of the really hostile man is a sweet old guy straight from Mexico. (His adult son is the real asshole in question.) I heard him talking about how much he misses having dogs, and he has told me before how much he likes Keeva, etc. I think he probably just has very different ideas about dogs than we do and thinks he's giving them a harmless treat. I still don't like it, and it needs to stop, but I think it was innocuous.

The food/crap being dumped out the window, I have zero tolerance for. I think it's disgusting, disrespectful, and needs to stop like yesterday. And I do not want them to EVER let themselves into our yard without permission, much less without shutting the freaking gate behind themselves. I definitely think that they're displacing their hostility with our landlords onto us and our dogs. And lest anyone should ask, our dogs are never nuisance and never left outside alone to bark excessively, etc.

I want to take care of this ASAP without further provoking them. I'm here for 9 more months that they could make REALLY unpleasant if they wanted to. I'm getting "Dog on Premises" signs for the gates, and I'm going to talk to my landlords about putting padlocks on the gates as well. The food thing... I don't know. A note? That's the only way they've EVER communicated with us before, I've literally never spoken to Angelo (the asshole) in person. I would feel SUPER uncomfortable knocking on their door, tbh.

Cookies if you read the whole **** thing!
 
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#2
You need your landlord's permission to padlock your own gates? Well that sucks :(

Have you thought about moving the food back into their yard until they get the hint? That way you are avoiding any direct confrontation and if you are asked about it you will have the opportunity to explain yourself.
 

puppydog

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#3
Sigh. I feel your pain. I have a neighbour from hell too. :(

Unfortunately, I think you need to speak to them in person.
 
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#4
First I have a question, what kind of cookies do we get? I hope nothing with raisins, but pretty much anything else would be great :)

Other than that. Talk to the dad or the asshole, don't be accusatory or anything because that will most likely lead to confrontation that you obviously don't want. Just ask them if they've seen anyone entering the back yard thru the fence because you noticed it open were worried. If they notice someone again to let you know. Maybe drop a hint about your roomates dog being less than friendly and you don't want your dogs to get out and get hurt or have someone come in and have a dog bite.

about the food? I don't know. Egg shells are messy but they aren't going to cause much harm. the food in the yard? I would have to ask them to stop. Use some excuse about them being on a strict diet or allergies to stuff they put in the hot dogs or something, but if they'd like to give them treats sometimes you'd be happy to give them some "approved" stuff to give them when you are outside with them.

But i'd pick your battles
which is most important? because you could get by with one or two of these things if put the right way. I wouldn't do them all, and I wouldn't do them all at once either :)
 

Emily

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#5
You need your landlord's permission to padlock your own gates? Well that sucks :(

Have you thought about moving the food back into their yard until they get the hint? That way you are avoiding any direct confrontation and if you are asked about it you will have the opportunity to explain yourself.
They're not our gates - we rent them. ;) And somebody else lives upstairs and the yard is shared, so yes we would have to check with our landlords. They will say yes, but we need to ask first and distribute copies of the keys or combo properly.

LOL I didn't even think of tossing the food back over. That's not a bad idea actually. Or collecting everything in a plastic bag and setting it on their door. "We found this in our yard and we think it belongs to you!" LOL

My roommate wants to put a "NO DUMPING" sign in the kitchen window where they can see it.
 
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#6
They're not our gates - we rent them. And somebody else lives upstairs and the yard is shared, so yes we would have to check with our landlords. They will say yes, but we need to ask first and distribute copies of the keys or combo properly.
Ohhhh I see. Sorry we live in the Land Without Crosswalks and I'm not at all familiar with renting or urban living!

Good luck!
 

joce

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#7
How you don't loose it and go off screaming like a nut is beyond me because I would have.

I have issues with "this is mine,this is yours,don't touch mine" though. This is also why living in the city does not work for me.

I am guessing the neighbor is just one of those idiots who will never ever get it and you will have to make it through the rest of the lease watching the dogs closely. One run in with someone can be a misunderstanding but just leaving stuff open and acting like all is his makes me think he is not going to care what you say and may even go out of his way to be more of a pain to you.

You could try having a nice talk saying your dog has a lot of allergies and can only have certain foods. If the old man wants to give your dog a treat give him a bag of something that you feed-thts what I do with my grandpa cuz he feeds his dogs french fries and hamburgers and god knows what else!

Be careful! People are nuts and some really don't like being confronted so have a way out.
 
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#8
First I have a question, what kind of cookies do we get? I hope nothing with raisins, but pretty much anything else would be great :)

Other than that. Talk to the dad or the asshole, don't be accusatory or anything because that will most likely lead to confrontation that you obviously don't want. Just ask them if they've seen anyone entering the back yard thru the fence because you noticed it open were worried. If they notice someone again to let you know. Maybe drop a hint about your roomates dog being less than friendly and you don't want your dogs to get out and get hurt or have someone come in and have a dog bite.

about the food? I don't know. Egg shells are messy but they aren't going to cause much harm. the food in the yard? I would have to ask them to stop. Use some excuse about them being on a strict diet or allergies to stuff they put in the hot dogs or something, but if they'd like to give them treats sometimes you'd be happy to give them some "approved" stuff to give them when you are outside with them.

But i'd pick your battles
which is most important? because you could get by with one or two of these things if put the right way. I wouldn't do them all, and I wouldn't do them all at once either :)
I'd definitely start out with this route, especially from the way you describe the father. Maybe he'd like to visit with one of the dogs sometime?

Making friends with him would make it a lot more difficult for his son to be an asshat toward you ;)
 

Kilter

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I would approach the food thing as letting them know to be careful because someone is tossing meat into the yard and it could be poisioned, and hint that you are thinking of calling the police about it. Someone's yard could have kids in it as well and they don't need to find ground beef that's been sitting in the sun and get sick, or worse. Don't say they did anything, just let it be known you're concerned about poisioned meat and the risk to dogs and kids and not afraid to report it.

The rest... I'd be locking the gates for sure and just documenting things. And looking to move if it continues.

We had to talk to the neighbor at one place as the kids would take their garbage and stick it in the fence, my dogs would take it and shred it and the kids thought it was sooo funny. It got old fast having to do a total clean up of garbage by raking the entire area.
 

yoko

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#11
Could you talk to the dad and plan a time for him to play with the dogs or maybe give him approved treats to throw over or hide for them?
 

Emily

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#16
You don't think the asshole guy could be trying to poison your dogs do you? It happens all too often.
It's certainly possible, and that's why I don't let the dogs eat it ever.

To be fair, except for the crap out the window, we don't KNOW that they put the food there, although we're pretty sure. I think a letter that's along the lines of, "Dear Neighbor, you should that someone's been putting food in our yard since you have children and we wouldn't want anyone getting sick," would be appropriate given the information we have and would get the point across. But I'm still talking it over with the roommate.
 

Miakoda

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#17
A "pit bull" puppy I adopted out was killed by being poisoned when a neighbor threw raw meatballs into my friend's yard. Those "meatballs" were laced with Decon, and Cowboy bled to death internally. No amount of treatment was going to save him. He was only 4 months old.

IMO, any time someone is throwing food into your yard, your first thought should be "POISON!" and not "yuck...what a nuisance".

Honestly, I'd have the cops at my house every single time I found a scrap of food throw in my yard, and especially if my gate was left open.
 

Emily

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#18
A "pit bull" puppy I adopted out was killed by being poisoned when a neighbor threw raw meatballs into my friend's yard. Those "meatballs" were laced with Decon, and Cowboy bled to death internally. No amount of treatment was going to save him. He was only 4 months old.

IMO, any time someone is throwing food into your yard, your first thought should be "POISON!" and not "yuck...what a nuisance".

Honestly, I'd have the cops at my house every single time I found a scrap of food throw in my yard, and especially if my gate was left open.
That WAS my first thought. Until I realized it happened after every time the neighbors had a cookout.

I live in Chicago proper. The cops are won't do jack about something this minor. Sucks but it's true. They're busy.
 

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