Most of the time, you WILL have trouble if the neighbour does not respond to your first requests. Take 'em to court, but have many hours of dog barking recorded on video first.

As a long suffering victim of dog barking, I know the lack of law enforcement and the bullying that one will be subjected to. I have had my garden poisonned, taken to court on stalking charges and much much more because these dog owners think it is their god given right to disturb the neighbourhood with their dogs barking.

Go hard, boots and all. Bully back and give them as much as they dish out. buy a truck horn and use it each time their dog barks. Write to the papers and make as much noise about the barking as you can.

Nothing will get done on this issue unless we victims band together and stand up for the right to peace in our own homes. I do not care a hoot for any arguments for dog barking. Our homes are paid for by us, and we want peace in our homes.

I declare war on barking dog owners, and you should too. Enough is enough!

To hell with barking dogs and their bullying owners. Shut your dogs up, how hard can it be you lazy good for nothing dog owners! Blame yourselves for the lack of care for your dog, do not blame the victim of the barking. Fools!

www.barkactiongroup.org

Who wrote this article? Clearly, it was written by someone who knows nothing about the bad health effects that emanate from (a) force-fed neighbourhood barking into the domestic environs of those who do not want this discomfort and (b) who believes that an innocent recipient of this kind of pollution should be encouraged to sit across the table from a dog-owner who either permits a dog to bark, or is unaware of its behaviour. "Mediation" implies that there are two sides to this kind of illegal, intrusive, careless transmission of noise into someone else's living and sleeping rooms. If a law is broken, causing invasive noise pollution into a neighbouring property, there must be no financial penalty on innocent objectors.

The suggestion that receivers of barking dog noise should help pay for remediation is nonsensical.

Consider this analogy: do you really think that someone who learns by default that their kids are using drugs, or engaging in other types of unhealthy behaviour, can be excused for their ignorance by saying "oh, I didn't know my kids were doing that until someone told me"??? In the same way, it is the responsibility of dog-owners to ensure they know the pattern of their dogs' behaviour, including when the owners are at home, and also when they are absent. It is dog owners' responsibility to ensure that their privilege of keeping a dog is NOT interfering with the sleep, comfort and quiet enjoyment of their neighbours' homes. There is sufficient modern health research now available that equates this kind of pollution as serious a human health hazard as was second-hand cigarette smoke 40 years ago.

It is just a matter of time before those who keep a barking dog will find themselves in the same derided, despised category as the population's majority of smokers who once ruled the shared environment with impunity, but are today viewed as social pariahs.

December 7, 2007

The remedies suggested by Sgt. Peter Mainzer of the Animal Control Unit are nonsensical, and are just aimed at avoiding doing anything about the barking dog. For a full discussion on barking dogs, go to : www.barkingdogs.net .

It appears that the pet industry are determined to get at least two dogs into every house, and this is a very powerful corporate lobby group. It seems to have Animal Control at all levels in their pockets. Remember: Keeping a barking dog is breaking the law - there is a perpetrator and there is a victimj. Keeping a noisy dog which destroys the lives of others is a crime and should be dealt with as such. The World Health Organisation and many others have voluminous reports now about the very real danger to health of noise, inclusing barking dogs.

Mainzer failed to mention that Albemarle County ACTUALLY excludes dog barking as noise pollution in its zoning ordinance. Other counties don't! I live in Peavine Hollow in the county and my neighbor prostitutes their 4 or 5 dogs for profit

(breeding) and claim they need them all to guard about 5 acres. They bark at nothing most of the time 24/7. The arrogance of these people seems to be it is their God given right to introduce whatever noise pollution they want(greed has no boundary.) I am all for property rights but not when your pollution crosses my property and others.

We and others have made them aware as Mainzer suggests and called the useless county police/animal control with no remedy. Until we get Supervisors with real balls, I'd say Gimmie Shelter wasted our time with this bogus column....good PR for the county though. Catlin must be proud. lol

Expecting the VICTIMS to pay for a product to keep the ignorant, dog owners dog quiet amounts to extorsion.

Next they will expect the victim to pay for the dogs food and to take it to doggy day school to keep it happy.Sgt Peter Mainzer is encouraging bullies to act as tyrants. Noise pollution is acoustic assult seargent. Does he encourage victims of assult to buy their abusers presents?

What an ignorant person. He needs to be educated on the MEDICAL facts about the damaging effects of unwanted noise on populations.

Residents for Responsible Pet ownership

It is sad to see that the author, presumably a law enforcement official, is claiming that the victim is expected to indulge the bully victimizer.

Does he also encourage battered spouses to just talk it over with the abuser and perhaps settle for fewer beatings, and no, not to involve law enforcement, because the abuser could get all upset?

Matthew above says it well:

we need to "stand up for the right to peace in our own homes. I do not care a hoot for any arguments for dog barking. Our homes are paid for by us, and we want peace in our homes....Enough is enough!"

To the ignorant people who buy these yelping, irritating, useless dogs from peavine hollow farm I'd say unless you have at least 75 acres or more you are inviting trouble with your neighbors. To show how ignorant and arrogent these dog pimps are, these people enclose these breeding factories in less than one acre pads and place them on the road so they can bark at everything and nothing. I'd say get a collie that is MUCH better behaved than these lazy maremmas.

The only truly effective answer to the worsening owner/dog problem is No Dogs Anywhere. There is even an Internet petition of that name.

The next-best solution is Dog-free Communities. There's a Petition of that name, too.