Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[martinuzz]

Dang, my cat nearly got eaten today. I really wish I could teach her to be a little bit afraid of dogs.
As it is, she just stands her ground and stares disapprovingly at dogs, and bitch-slaps them in the face (without scratching) if they get too close.
It hasn't been a problem before because most people walking their dog in the neighborhood either have the goofy dofus type dog that ignores cats, or have cats themselves at home, and a dog that just wants to sniff my cat's behind in a friendly way.

But now there's this new dude in town, with a 2 year old bulldog with ADHD on steroids. And he doesn't seem to particularily care if his dog eats my cat or not, in fact he kinda encouraged it.
If I hadn't shoo'd my cat away myself, it would have been grabbed and eaten.
Not sure how to fix. My cats can go in and out freely, and this one cat picked up the habit of walking with me and my dog. Now my dog died over 2 years ago, but the cat still demands I walk with her once or twice a day, and she even rather poops and pees at the base of trees instead of using the litterbox.

I guess I could stop walking her, but that would probably just mean she'd go by herself, since my cats can go in and out freely.

I really don't get the attitude of some folks. Why would you think it's cool and fun when your dog chases and tries to kill someone's cat? Fucking sociopaths.

[Sirus]

Some dipshits get off on hurting animals, I think. Throwing poisoned food at them, setting them on fire. Dipshits.

[Hanslanda]

I hate to recommend violence, but I am fairly sure defending your cat from a vicious dog is legal. Just keep a bat or gun by the door.

[Dunamisdeos]

I would talk to the guy, be like hey no one wants an incident, are you confident that you can stop your dog from getting at my cat? We share the walking areas after all, neighbor.

But I mean, if he was actively, deliberately encouraging his pet to hurt mine? I would let him know that if his dog causes injury to my cat I'll pop his dog's head off like a Snapple top.

[martinuzz]

I would talk to the guy, be like hey no one wants an incident, are you confident that you can stop your dog from getting at my cat? We share the walking areas after all, neighbor.

But I mean, if he was actively, deliberately encouraging his pet to hurt mine? I would let him know that if his dog causes injury to my cat I'll pop his dog's head off like a Snapple top.

Well, I tried talking to the guy in exactly that manner. Sadly this is one of those rowdy hooligan types, pumped up on steroids, and lacking a solid mid-nose from excessive coke use*, with the manners of a swine and less braincells than a Captain Iglo's fishstick, so that didn't help.

There's nothing legal to be done. Law sees pets as objects. If his dog were to kill my cat, most I can do is sue him for vandalism. Yea, that's right, killing a cat is 'vandalism' according to law.

Could try for animal cruelty, but that's a hard one to make stick. Animal cruelty laws are mostly in place for professional neglect by pet breeders and agricultural companies.

The gun and baseball bat aren't gonna work, that's just gonna get me in jail for excessive use of violence, and my then ownerless cats put down in an animal shelter 
Don't think that's a good solution.
Guns are illegal, and keeping a basebal bat anywhere else than in your sportsbag is illegal too.

*)snorting of cocaine damages the mucous membranes and eventually even dissolves the cartilage separating your two nose channels.

[Paxiecrunchle]

As an American I just find it really weird hearing about places where gun ownership overall sounds like it's illegal, carry on.

[Yoink]

Have you seen or read Trainspotting? There's a scene in there that you could emulate to solve this problem.
The movie version, not the one in the book, although it is only a minor point of difference.     

Edit:

As an American I just find it really weird hearing about places where gun ownership overall sounds like it's illegal, carry on.

You think that's weird? Try living in such a place. 

[SOLDIER First]

You should really just keep the cat inside. I understand that not every cat is the same, but three of the cats I've owned in my life have gotten outside and either disappeared or turned up dead. I don't at all recommend letting any cat outside if you don't have a reliable means of keeping them in your yard.

[Ghills]

I would talk to the guy, be like hey no one wants an incident, are you confident that you can stop your dog from getting at my cat? We share the walking areas after all, neighbor.

But I mean, if he was actively, deliberately encouraging his pet to hurt mine? I would let him know that if his dog causes injury to my cat I'll pop his dog's head off like a Snapple top.

Well, I tried talking to the guy in exactly that manner. Sadly this is one of those rowdy hooligan types, pumped up on steroids, and lacking a solid mid-nose from excessive coke use*, with the manners of a swine and less braincells than a Captain Iglo's fishstick, so that didn't help.

There's nothing legal to be done. Law sees pets as objects. If his dog were to kill my cat, most I can do is sue him for vandalism. Yea, that's right, killing a cat is 'vandalism' according to law.

Could try for animal cruelty, but that's a hard one to make stick. Animal cruelty laws are mostly in place for professional neglect by pet breeders and agricultural companies.

The gun and baseball bat aren't gonna work, that's just gonna get me in jail for excessive use of violence, and my then ownerless cats put down in an animal shelter 
Don't think that's a good solution.
Guns are illegal, and keeping a basebal bat anywhere else than in your sportsbag is illegal too.

*)snorting of cocaine damages the mucous membranes and eventually even dissolves the cartilage separating your two nose channels.

Sounds like this guy is the real problem, and it probably won't stop at vicarious violence through his dog. As soon as he does something that can be reported, either to animal control or the police, call it in.   Maybe he never will, in which case great!  But if he's not properly controlling his dog that's probably violating an ordinance right there.  Does your town have leash laws or other pet control statues?

[Egan_BW]

Get a new dog to walk your cat with?

[martinuzz]

New dog, I wish. Can't afford to feed more mouths.

Dogs do have to be leashed, but he has his dog on a leash. He fakes letting it slip though.
Reporting him for not using a leash would be pretty useless. He'd get fined 180 euros, and be able to read in the police records that it was me that filed charges.
If his dog were to bite my cat, it'd be a unintentional vandalism charge, and perhaps a judge will sentence him to reimburse me a new cat for 10 euros.
If his dog were to bite me, it would be put down by the police, and he'd probably buy a new dog. Don't think law forbids pet ownership after a first incident.
If he personally kills my cat, now there'd be a small possibility a criminal case would stick. Maximum sentence for animal abuse is 2 years, but that's not really reserved for single animal incidents. The two years is more like for dog breeders who keep dozens of litters in their own crap after being officially warned multiple times.

Dutch law just isn't very good at protecting pets.

And no, I won't keep my cats indoors, that'd be cruel, they've been able to go outside their entire lives.
Not gonna let some buttfuck ruin that for them.

[scriver]

Tip regardless of action: start filming how he acts when you meet. If anything happens to your cat you will have a hard time proving that it wasn't just an accident and that he has a history of acting like this. Build up a stock of filmed evidence that he does.

[scourge728]

1. Apparently the Netherlands has some pretty shit pet laws (although I WILL admit I'm not sure of the U.S.A's laws on such things)
2.I would also recommend keeping your cat(s) indoors (and so does Jackson Galaxy, that guy who runs My cat from hell) it's much better for their long term health, because of things like diseases and other animals (not just dogs, such things as foxes, badgers, wolves,bears,  and hawks all would gladly eat a cat, heck, beavers would probably kill a cat

EDIT: Yes I DID google animals of the Netherlands and then click on the Wikipedia page titled mammals of the Netherlands

[martinuzz]

The Netherlands does not have any native wildlife that is a threat to cats, nor do we have nasty diseases like rabies (there have been no domestic rabies cases in the Netherlands for over 50 years now, all cases we did have were tourists that got bitten in some foreign country).
I disagree on indoor being healthier for a cat over here. In my experience, indoor cats live up to 12-15 years of age, usually dying of hearth or kidney problems (overfeeding and/or lack of excercise does that), and have a tendency to grow lazy and fat.
All my family's outdoor cats (with the exception of one that got run over by a car) passed 20. Hell, my dad had a cat that lived up to 29-30, and all but the last year of it's life it happily roamed outside. My oldest 3 cats are 12 now, and they're lean, muscular and fit as a feline should be.

Now I'm not one of those guys that will tell you keeping a cat indoors is cruel in all circumstances. If you raise a kitten in an indoor environment, it can be perfectly happy, not knowing what it misses out on, and I can perfectly understand that if you live in bear/badger/wolf country, it could very well be the safest bet.
But cats like mine that have known nothing but being free to go where they want for all their life, you can't turn those into indoor cats. They'll turn neurotic and sad.

EDIT: looks like Google is pretty much wrong then about Dutch wildlife.
let's see... Foxes? Extremely rare. Won't find in cities like you can in the UK. Not a threat to city cats.
Wolves? Nope. Once every few years a German or Polish tourists pulls off a stunt, and drops a dead wolf on Dutch roads. Then the nature freaks all go hype 'THE WOLF HAS RETURNED TO THE NETHERLANDS AFTER BEING EXTINCT FOR 2 CENTURIES', only to come to the conclusion after genetic testing that it's a hoax wolf from Poland.
Bears? Lol, just no. There's no bears in the Netherlands. Don't think there have been for at least 1000 years.
Badgers? If you see one, call the newspaper. They're either extinct or maybe there's one breeding pair still hiding somewhere under a rock in the National Park de Hooge Veluwe.
Beavers? Okay, we have some that were released back into the wild about 20 years ago, and that turned out to be a really succesful project. Water management is even starting to ask permission to cull their populations, because their dams threaten our water management. They're nowhere near where I live though.
Hawks? We have some small birds of prey, they're pretty darn rare, and even the largest one is nowhere near large enough to tackle a cat.

[Rolan7]

I'm not sure a longer lifespan is worth it for being cooped up all the time, at least for cats who are used to going out.  Even when I lived in a third floor apartment, I walked with her.  (She always got confused and thought we lived on the second floor, heh, couldn't figure out why I insisted on going up farther).

She got her eventually-fatal injury on an unattended walk, but it was mostly complications.  I was away on a business trip, and gma couldn't tell until it got infected.  But she was getting old anyway.  She had maybe a year or two...  I think it was worth it, for her to stalk through the grass and feel unconfined even in her later years.  Living in the apartment, she would start getting lethargic if we didn't walk for too long.