I've had the strangest thing happening the past couple days, and had to share the story and maybe ask for advice...
Thursday morning: I had just gotten out of bed around 5:15AM, hearing my dogs barking at something in the yard. I looked out my window and saw what appeared to be a big cat run full speed right past my window with my dogs in close pursuit. I didn't get a good look at it, as it was dark and I just saw it out of the corner of my eye. Didn't think much of it.
Thursday night: I'm in my kitchen at around 9PM, and out in my backyard, in the dark I can vaguely see what appears to be another dog with long hair out there with my 2 dogs (mine are shorthair, so it wasn't familiar). I go out there to see a little nasty looking sheepdog (maybe a collie?) black and white, basically trying to hump my female bullmastiff! I'm very protective of my dogs and obviously the tortoises I have out there, so I run out there yelling at it, and it ran out the sideyard and jumped over the same 6' block wall that it apparently jumped over to get into my yard.
Friday night: Around 1AM (Saturday morning), I wake up to the sound of my wife's voice as she's screaming at the same damn dog back there doing the same damn thing (she caught it trying to mount my dog). Right as I look out the window, I see the dog run out that same sideyard. I sat in front of a sideyard window for an hour after that with a 4' piece of PVC pipe in my hand waiting for this thing to come back. It never did.
Saturday night: My wife was working the night shift, so I'm home alone, sleeping with the back window open to listen for anything going on. Again, around 1AM (Sunday morning), I wake up and can hear the gravel right outside the window being rustled around, like the dogs are up to something out there. Instead of giving it the opportunity to make the same escape it's made 3 times before, I went around the front of the house in my pajamas (underwear) with my trusty PVC pipe. As I'm going around the front corner of my house into the sideyard, this dog is coming over the wall right at me. It scared the crap out of both of us. By the time I could react, the dog had bolted past me at about 40mph right down the middle of the street into the darkness. I swore I saw a different dog go back into my backyard, so I ran through the house looking for it out back. I walk outside onto my back patio, look left, look right, nothing... Then I look right in front of me and there's this tall lanky dog (a good sized dog, probably at least 110-120 lbs) standing right in the middle of my lawn. Again, scared the crap out of me. The thing looks over at me and starts it's run around the sideyard. This time, it's me in full pursuit. I still had my pipe in my hands, and wasn't going to be able to catch the dog by the time it made it around my house, so I chucked the pipe at it as a last ditch effort to instill some fear into these things, and I didn't miss. It hopped right over the wall like the first dog. I ended up keeping my dogs inside that night and again last night.
So my options are getting progressively more hostile towards these things as reoccurence happens, so I figured I'd ask if anyone had any ideas to keep someone else's dogs out of my yard. It's gotta be neighbor dogs probably from someone 5-10 houses down, as I live basically in a small neighborhood surrounded by desert. There's not much of a population out there, and dogs couldn't come from too far. Even if I can prevent them from coming over that side, they still have the option of the other side if they really wanted to, and my tortoises are as big of a concern for me as anything (I sometimes leave little babies outside overnight with the nice weather this time of year). My dogs have finally learned to leave the torts alone, but these other dogs would probably carry them off in a heartbeat if they found them.
Take my pre-emptive apology to anyone who is bothered by the fact that I'm having violent thoughts about these dogs, but there's only a few things in life that can really infuriate me, and these dogs were really pushing those boundaries.
Thursday morning: I had just gotten out of bed around 5:15AM, hearing my dogs barking at something in the yard. I looked out my window and saw what appeared to be a big cat run full speed right past my window with my dogs in close pursuit. I didn't get a good look at it, as it was dark and I just saw it out of the corner of my eye. Didn't think much of it.
Thursday night: I'm in my kitchen at around 9PM, and out in my backyard, in the dark I can vaguely see what appears to be another dog with long hair out there with my 2 dogs (mine are shorthair, so it wasn't familiar). I go out there to see a little nasty looking sheepdog (maybe a collie?) black and white, basically trying to hump my female bullmastiff! I'm very protective of my dogs and obviously the tortoises I have out there, so I run out there yelling at it, and it ran out the sideyard and jumped over the same 6' block wall that it apparently jumped over to get into my yard.
Friday night: Around 1AM (Saturday morning), I wake up to the sound of my wife's voice as she's screaming at the same damn dog back there doing the same damn thing (she caught it trying to mount my dog). Right as I look out the window, I see the dog run out that same sideyard. I sat in front of a sideyard window for an hour after that with a 4' piece of PVC pipe in my hand waiting for this thing to come back. It never did.
Saturday night: My wife was working the night shift, so I'm home alone, sleeping with the back window open to listen for anything going on. Again, around 1AM (Sunday morning), I wake up and can hear the gravel right outside the window being rustled around, like the dogs are up to something out there. Instead of giving it the opportunity to make the same escape it's made 3 times before, I went around the front of the house in my pajamas (underwear) with my trusty PVC pipe. As I'm going around the front corner of my house into the sideyard, this dog is coming over the wall right at me. It scared the crap out of both of us. By the time I could react, the dog had bolted past me at about 40mph right down the middle of the street into the darkness. I swore I saw a different dog go back into my backyard, so I ran through the house looking for it out back. I walk outside onto my back patio, look left, look right, nothing... Then I look right in front of me and there's this tall lanky dog (a good sized dog, probably at least 110-120 lbs) standing right in the middle of my lawn. Again, scared the crap out of me. The thing looks over at me and starts it's run around the sideyard. This time, it's me in full pursuit. I still had my pipe in my hands, and wasn't going to be able to catch the dog by the time it made it around my house, so I chucked the pipe at it as a last ditch effort to instill some fear into these things, and I didn't miss. It hopped right over the wall like the first dog. I ended up keeping my dogs inside that night and again last night.
So my options are getting progressively more hostile towards these things as reoccurence happens, so I figured I'd ask if anyone had any ideas to keep someone else's dogs out of my yard. It's gotta be neighbor dogs probably from someone 5-10 houses down, as I live basically in a small neighborhood surrounded by desert. There's not much of a population out there, and dogs couldn't come from too far. Even if I can prevent them from coming over that side, they still have the option of the other side if they really wanted to, and my tortoises are as big of a concern for me as anything (I sometimes leave little babies outside overnight with the nice weather this time of year). My dogs have finally learned to leave the torts alone, but these other dogs would probably carry them off in a heartbeat if they found them.
Take my pre-emptive apology to anyone who is bothered by the fact that I'm having violent thoughts about these dogs, but there's only a few things in life that can really infuriate me, and these dogs were really pushing those boundaries.
