Today we decided to drive through a rural area, mostly because we read that it had a number of Amish farms. Sure enough, we passed quite a few of them. It was nice to see some gardens because, quite frankly, we've seen extremely few gardens here.
As we continued up the road, I noticed a number of dogs lounging in the grass alongside the road in front of a non-Amish house. All of the sudden, the car was surrounded by over a dozen dogs, barking, jumping, running in circles. They showed no fear of being run over and no-one came running out of the house to round them up. We proceeded at just a couple of miles an hour giving the dogs time to get out of the way. They continued to surround and attack the car for several minutes while I sat petrified that we'd hear the crunch of tires rolling over a dog at any moment.
Finally, we got through them and gunned it. We stopped a while later and I checked the rental car for scratches. Holy Cow! The entire front bumper is covered with deep claw marks which stripped the paint and gouged the plastic. There are a number of tooth punctures in it as well. Thanks to this irresponsible country resident (not the first words that come to mind), we now have a problem on our hands. The bumper is part of the entire front panel of this car and would be expensive to replace. Our insurance would probably cover this but our deductible is $250. My sweetie thinks he might be able to use filler and vehicle touch-up paint to repair this but I think it will be very difficult to match the factory finish.
This experience makes us think twice about our plans. We want to buy a home with a bit of land. This probably means not being right in town. How the heck would we deal with a neighbor like this? How would we able to bike past a pack of dogs like this? I talked to a couple of local folks at the laundromat this afternoon and one gal mentioned they had a similar problem with a neighbor. Calling the sheriff and talking to the neighbor did no good and they continued to have problems with the neighbor's dogs until her husband resolved it himself. (Don't ask.)
Why does trying to find a way to build a sustainable and more self-sufficient life have to be so difficult?!
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25 comments:
Ick, how obnoxious!
All I can say to something like this is that I don't think it's necessarily the norm. I grew up in a rural area (we had about 2 acres and were in the middle of corn country), and never had any problems like that or heard of any. I think if that had been going on, animal control/police would have actually responded. So maybe check out the neighbors before you buy? Or see if you can move to a town where you feel like you could trust the police?
Packs of wild dogs are one of the scariest things to encounter: EVER. The only worse is a pack of wild people.
This reminds me of the Fruitvale exit in Oakland/Alameda where a pack of wild dogs used to roam around the neighborhood and I wondered how anyone could live somewhere knowing that this unchecked feral bunch of urban wolves might descend on you at any moment.
I'm so sorry to hear that the car got damaged! That is such a huge bummer!
I think you will find a place. Finding a rural position that is comfortable and feels right doesn't happen overnight though.
Oooops... Sorry I left my dogs out! Just kidding, but one of my major pet peeves? Dog owners without a lick of responsibility. My mutts aren't the most well behaved, but I don't let them run loose, poop in other people's yards or chew up rental cars. That's just bad manners! I hope the rest of your trip is doggie terror free!
Wow - that's awful. I once had a rental car keyed - why do things happen when it's not your stuff? Not that you'd want your own car scratched up, but at least you could live with it and not have to pay. I never got charged for the keying though - don't know if they didn't notice it right away or what.
The only way to deal with this sort of thing is to make the owners responsible. Call animal control. Take pictures and send these people the bills for the repair. Thank goodness that you were not on bicycles.
Wendy
This is awful!
I complained endlessly on our bike trip about being chased by dogs (not like the ones you encountered) and our friends reading our blog just couldn't understand why this was an issue. We've heard of and met people using their hunting rifles to shoot these annoying things. A better alternative for those gasping at this solution was to repeatedly call animal control like Wendy suggested until the problem was resolved.
Unfortunately, we didn't notice the address so there's no way to file a complaint. And there is no way in you-know-what we are going back down that road!
Unfortunately, animal control isn't always helpful. When we had an incident with two dogs attacking ours (not Angel) several years ago, it was a full month before an officer showed up to take the report.
I think really checking out the neighborhood before buying is going to be very important!
As a city dweller most of my life, I was surprised at how little I fit into the rural area where we settled last year. It was difficult for us, and we ended up finding it less sustainable overall... I would not only suggest checking out the neighborhood, but spending a good amount of time there - going to the store, reading the paper, checking out sources for all the things you find important in your life. And living there for at least a few days to get a sense of the people, lifestyle, jobs, and transportation. We found we lived in a place where we had to drive too far for basics, for example.
Sorry to hear about the car. I bet there's a farmer nearby that thins that herd every now and then.
Three words for next time...Stand.. On..It. Chances are you reeeally don't want to come in contact with the owner. If you plan to live there, a shotgun should probably sit near the door....it is goat gulch after all.
WOW - how scary that must have been. Glad you are OK. I bet Angel was upset.
Always interview prospective neighbors. So, so very important!
That's awful! I can't stand people that aren't responsible with their dogs.
On the bright side, if you intend to drive the car until it drops you don't HAVE to make it look nice. I've never bothered with any of my cars. I just fill dings, prime, paint with the same can of paint I've had for cars since the beginning, and topcoat to protect the metal. They are all painted white, since that is what I have. My car has little polka dots. They really aren't that noticable... and they sell factory tubesof paint at auto supply stores to get a closer look. It's just a car, and like my house it has "character". :)
As far as neighbors... I'd go knockon the doors of the neighbors surrounding houses you look at. Are they nice? Walk/drive by at at least three different times of day to see what it's like. (Helpful for us with our new house, as there is quite a bit of traffic during the day that almost turned us off of it, but it drops to nothing at night as it is all to the library and rec center across the street). Good luck!
When considering property to purchase, and when being shown around by the real estate agent, a good idea is to stand outside for a minute and listen. Do you hear the annoying bark of dogs? Could you live with that? Also...ask for a drink of water from the tap. So many people buy property only to complain about water quality afterward. If you can't drink the water due to quality or smell, chances are that won't change if you purchase...
Wendy
Could be that the owners weren't home or you may have wandered onto a private road without knowing it.
Or simply it happened because it is tolerated.
We have alot of friends & family who are rual, yeah we don't hate we hang with everyone, lol. Anyways this scenerio happens often. When we were kids my Tia came running out of the house with a shot gun. Way cool a Puerto Rican Cowgirl huh. Well no she was aiming at a pack of dogs running toward us kids playing on the front lawn of their farmhouse.
She got off a few rounds and hit one. Needless to say she had our endless respect!
Besides the laundromat hang in the public library, county's property record office, and if they have a historical society for all the best dirt err I mean background information on the area your considering.
That sucks! We are down a mile long dirt road and sometimes the neighbor's dog runs up to say hi when we drive by but they don't attack the car. Yeah, you want to really check out the neighbors before you move somewhere. Most likely, that was a pack of wild dogs, not someone's dogs. Apparently a few years ago there was a wild dog problem on this street. They took care of it in about a week and now we just have the pet dogs here.
Okay, that's just crazy. I'm guessing you'll pass on that particular area but I guess it is one of the hazards of living out in a rural area. Of course, there are down sides to almost everything. Maybe you could live a bit closer to a town and still have a big plot of land. Oh well, good luck. Let the adventure continue.
Where i grew up, country people watched out for packs of feral dogs and didn't slow down for farm dogs in the road - smart dogs get out of the way, dumb dogs get hit. And, conversely, you don't let a big dog out unwatched because you want to be able to vouch for it if someone loses a calf, and you don't let out a small dog unwatched because of the chance of feral dogs.
This is one of the downsides of picking a place with little zoning or a "do what you want with your own property" ethos - you can build your composting outhouse, but your neighbors can keep mean dogs or sell out to a CAFO with a giant manure lagoon.
I <3 the city. I'm never living outside of takeout chinese range ever again. If we have an aggressive, unrestrained dog in the neighborhood, law enforcement deals with it.
I don't know if it's possible to find a neighborhood with no drug users and no bad dogs, though (just thinking back to your older posts about where you want to live.)
Good Gracious,
The balance between community and self reliance certainly is a hard one to find.
I hope you manage to find the place that speaks to you. It really does help when you have to ride the down times if you love something about the place.
Kind Regards
Belinda
Unfortunately when it comes to that kind of dog issue the first phrase that comes to mind is "shoot, shovel and shut up". I'm a huge dog lover but after having a beloved Corgi girl get attacked a few years ago by two ferals (over 80 puncture wounds and she absorbed a much wanted litter of puppies) I am no longer willing to give the owners or the dogs the benefit of the doubt.
It's one thing to have someone's pet come up to you and want to be loved on, it's a total 'nother thing to be attacked by a wild animal which is essentially what unmanaged canines can easily become.
Being rural means dealing with this kind of issue. Yet another reason I'm on land IN town.
I live in a very rural area and yes, we do have dog packs. You know where our dog packs come from? City people dropping their dogs off in the country.
It infuriates me. Around here we observe the 3 s rule. Shoot, shovel, shut-up. Neighborhood dogs learn not to mess around and generally stay in their own area. City dogs turned out in the country are worse than coyotes! They aren't afraid of people and they have a grudge to settle.
So city people -- take you dog to the pound if you don't want it!
And Chili -- rural people take a while to warm up to neighbors. We've seen lots of city kids move out here, try to change the system too fast, and end up moving.
Rural life takes a lot of patience. But if you can stick it out, hear the wisdom of the elders, and remain nice it is worth the time and effort.
Off my soap box now!
Kim
So sorry to hear about that, it's scary and annoying!
Watch this video, you don't necessarily need acreage: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mCPEBM5ol0Q
How about semi-rural or small town with large yards. In the college town I recommended to you I have friends who have properties with over an acre of yard.
diana
The video is Homegrown Revolution.
I second what anonymous said. A small/rural town is the way to go.
I live in a small midwestern town, pop. 10,000 and I love it. I live on a one acre lot a short walking distance from my kids' school, my office, great vegetarian restaurants, and a locally owned natural food store, and the property prices are low. My neighbors are always there to help when needed and I help them too. The key is to find a place that you love enough to really want to move there as opposed to feeling like you are being forced to flee your current home by concerns about peak oil. That psychological difference is key to a successful move.
Living in the country is not as ideal as some people think, it requires a lot of driving into town for this and that and can be very isolated due to depopulation in the last century and doesn't have much to offer in the way of community, which is an important part of surviving peak oil in my opinion.
The Amish are also way over romanticized. They are just people and can make good or bad neighbors like anyone else. They don't generally treat their animals all that well.
Hopefully you will never again have packs of dogs attacking your car, but if you do, the trick is NOT to slow down and give them a chance to get in front of your car, if you have slowed down speed up steadily until you are going faster than they are and they will get out of your way. Dogs like that have made a game out of this and are unlikely to get hit. And after you saw what they did to your car, I bet part of you wouldn't have minded so very much. ;p
Thanks, everyone, for all the advice! We have news about this proposed move which I will share in a day or so.
I'm reading a book about a woman that travels all over the world and after reading your post she got bit in Nepal and then again somewhere else and then a pack of dogs in eskimo country chased her because she had frozen seal eyebrows in her pocket that she couldn't bear to eat (it's a long story). She ran tossing seal parts to the dogs. And I thought of your experience and concluded the damn things are everywhere. I hope the remainder of your trip is wild dog free.
Just to clarify a couple of points:
1. These definitely were not wild or feral dogs. They belonged to this particular house, were well fed, and a number of them were probably siblings.
2. We're not city-slickers ignorant of rural ways. We've lived off the grid on 37 acres with neighbors that had a few loose dogs - including the ones idiots dumped on the side of the road, one of which impregnated their 10 year old bitch resulting in puppies of which we got first pick (our last dog)- horses, and a goat. I had to rescue their loose goat once and take it back up to their ranch in my truck, missing a doctor's appointment because I figured them getting their goat back was more important than my check-up...
3. Lastly, there is no way I am in good enough shape to outrun over a dozen agressive dogs on my bike! Yikes.
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