My dogs killed neighbors chicken

[Gator6x4]

I would not own a horse in a state that did not have specific equine laws. florida has such laws. They state that the owner of the horses are not liable for personal injury to participants caused by the horses at an equine event. An equine event is defined as any place the horse is basically. home, barn, pasture, riding areena, show.. etc. participant is anyone who approaches a horse.

So if you walk up to a horse pasture and pet a horse and it bites you, and you are in florida. .. too bad. horses are inherently large and dangerous animals. therefore voulentarilly being near them limits your rights...

If I lived in Florida and owned a horse I would have the property well posted with signs, to insure I was in compliance with the Florida Law. The law states the property has to be posted and even provides the wording that must be on the sign.

Florida Equine Activity Liability Statute



773.04. Posting and notification

(1) Every equine activity sponsor and equine professional shall:

(a) Post and maintain one or more signs which contain the warning notice specified in subsection (2). These signs shall be placed in a clearly visible location near to where the equine activity begins. The warning notice specified in subsection (2) shall appear on the sign in black letters, with each letter to be a minimum of 1 inch in height, with sufficient color contrast to be clearly distinguishable.

(b) Give the participant a written document which the participant shall sign with the warning notice specified in subsection (2) clearly printed on it. Said written document may be used in lieu of posting the warning on the site of the equine activity sponsor's or equine professional's facility, and shall be given to any participant in an equine event not on the location of the equine activity sponsor's or equine professional's facility.

(2) The signs and document described in subsection (1) shall contain the following warning notice:

WARNING

Under Florida law, an equine activity sponsor or equine professional is not liable for an injury to, or the death of, a participant in equine activities resulting from the inherent risks of equine activities.

 

[Soundguy]

If I lived in Florida and owned a horse I would have the property well posted with signs, to insure I was in compliance with the Florida Law. The law states the property has to be posted and even provides the wording that must be on the sign.

.

Yup.. they sell those signs pre- made.

I have them at the entrance to my property, and at the barn as well.

The 'partiipants' have ample opportunity to not come in if they wish after reading the postings.... If they want to come in .. then thay are participants.

 

[jaotguy]

biting dog = get rid of it ( send to a farm far way , give to an old timer for company in the woods , put down , do anything except keep it )

with the dog gone , there is proof that you "did something about it .. the threat is gone " ... a responsible dog owner ...

dead chicken .... it was off the owner's property, if anyone asks, " you were just returning his property to the owner as you found it , Fox /coyote must have got it " and you didn't want your animals to get a taste of chicken and become killers.

 

[tcreeley]

In my area if a dog harasses my animals on my property, I am entitled to shoot it. I figure the next time your dogs see a chicken wandering on the other side of that invisible fence, they are going over. Then will you be facing a neighbor out to shoot your dog? Put a fence up - chain link or page wire. Protect your dogs from their own actions.

Our neighbors 2 dogs came and broke in our fenced in chicken yard and killed 4 chickens, ran two down inside the yard after crawling under the wire - the smaller dog. The other two were dragged out or got run down trying to escape through the hole the smaller dog made. I didn't see it happen but I tracked the feathers back over. Since then the dogs don't come over here, chained. Couple years earlier, one came over and got kicked by one of the horses. We found out about this after. My wife was riding up the road and stopped to talk. The bigger dog was growling and backing off. The owner explained why. The kick had broken his dog's jaw. They remembered each other.
Once I was getting dressed and I heard a commotion out in the back (in my 20's at the time) from our landlord's chicken coop. The little terrier from next door was in and after them. I ran out half dressed and grabbed the dog around the neck and squeezed it hard enough that it shi_t, then I flung it out the door. I don't like dogs messing with chickens. Our dogs have never bothered our chickens. Just have to raise them right.
We had a dalmatian visit our farm one night as a kid- went after the fenced in leghorn chickens and killed 70 of them. My stepfather used the shotgun on him. Looked as pretty dead as alive, stupid dog.

 

[Soundguy]

correct on raising animals correctly.

my dogs, cats and chickens all mingle.

I have pictures of one of my cats eating out of his feeder in the barn with a chicken eating cat food too. I've never had a cat or dog on my farm that hasselled another animal. one time had a horse step on a rooster and kill it.. also had a blind horse step on a dog.. no serious injury there... no malice.. just accident.

 

[J F]

Where's the op? :confused3:

 

[sseelhoff]

Where's the op? :confused3:

Maybe he and the dog stepped out for a bite?

 

[J F]

Maybe he and the dog stepped out for a bite?

Just quit it.

 

[LD1]

I hope everything works out well for the op.

I am not.going.to be quick to jump to conclusions only based on what has been said. Its a crazy world we live in. And lots of sue happy people. While the op may indeed loose a lawsuit over the biting of the neighbor, I think that would be wrong. Dogs are smart, and can sense things. If the op was raising g his voice toward the neighbor, warning her not to approach, and she did anyway and made a move toward the dog, no doubt the dog felt threatened and/or felt the op was being threatened.

As to the chicken, dogs are predatory animals by nature. And unless the dog was raised with chickens, it didn't know any better.

I have 2 dogs and 2, cats. They all get along great. But the dogs also take care of any groundhogs, coon, opossum, etc that threaten their territory. I imagine if a neighbor of mine had chickens, it would be no different, cause they haven't been taught otherwise. But cats are fine, cause they have been taught to ignore their predatory instincts towards them.

If I were the op, I wouldn't make any rash decisions just yet. Talk to and get a feel for the neighbor first. Invisible fence, hard fence, etc. No matter what you do, if the dog wants out, it will eventually succeed. And no matter what, its the dogs turf and it will defend it for you. If the neighbor had a knife or gun (which the dog has no way of knowing) you would have been praising. So I guess my question would be, in the midst of all of this, did you give the dog any commands? Or were they all directed at the neighbor to halt which she ignored? If you were giving the dog commands that were ignored, obviously you need to work with the dog some more. But if your commands were only directed at the neighbor, I cannot fault the dog at all.:2cents:

 

[wroughtn_harv]

correct on raising animals correctly.

my dogs, cats and chickens all mingle.

I have pictures of one of my cats eating out of his feeder in the barn with a chicken eating cat food too. I've never had a cat or dog on my farm that hasselled another animal. one time had a horse step on a rooster and kill it.. also had a blind horse step on a dog.. no serious injury there... no malice.. just accident.

The only issue I have with your philosophy is your predators, aka cats and dogs, aren't all the predators your prey animals, chickens etc, will be exposed to over time. When a prey animal loses their fear of predators they lose. I've lost goats, rabbits, and chickens to canines just because they lost their fear of canines, fatal mistake on their part. I try to keep the canines separate from the prey animals when possible. I also won't allow the dogs to visit the Red Deer for the same reason, dogs lose, especially if they see all the farm animals as buds and we keep the deer wild as we can.