I walk my dog daily and this past thursday he finds a gopher hole on the side of my neighbors yard, I was distracted so i let him dig into the hole for about a minute before pulling him away.
On friday we go on a walk again and this time a different neighbor calls out to me and says "hey man, you’re being blasted on the neighboorhood facebook group." me being a bit shocked reply with "what? uhh thanks for letting me know". I continue the walk and i open up facebook to check and there it is, a post with a screenshot of my face smiling and my dog with his head inside this gopher hole. I wish i could post the screenshot of it but that’s against the rules on this sub so i’ll just copy and paste what was posted about me "Neighbor: The behavior you allow your dog and the damage to property that isn’t yours…says a lot. Don’t be this dude. To the dude: knock it off and come back to fill in the hole you smiled about.."
I don’t go on facebook often so that post had been there all day with about 20 replies from various people calling me names and saying how i was a terrible person. At this point i’m feeling pretty stressed and embarrassed, i drive over to her house with some gardening gloves to fix the hole my dog made, this is where my feelings changed a bit, the said hole that i fixed was half a handful of dirt being moved around that took all of about 5 seconds to "fix". In my opinion, this was borderline a non-issue and completely ignorable, to claim property damage is absolutely absurd.
I left a $15 starbucks giftcard on her door and went back home to reply to the facebook post. I admitted fault, told her i fixed the hole and apologized and explained to her that i thought the yard was unmaintained so i let my dog look at the gopher hole for a bit before pulling him away. apologized again for the inconvenience then left it at that.
I then proceed to spend the entire weekend monitoring this post, stressed out. The post finally gets a reply on sunday night from said neighbor with "@me dude you’re the man. Appreciate you. We’re fighting th gopher situation…it’s an uphill battle. Thank you for coming back to assist!" then deletes the entire thread 5 minutes later.
I’m glad the issue is solved and gone but this doesnt feel right to me, i feel like she was super manipulative to claim i damaged her property then to post the photo of me and my dog to publicly harass and shame me over something so trivial… I would’ve looked like more of an asshole if i tried to defend myself on that facebook post "hey the damage my dog did wasnt that bad, just chill out" So i feel like i unfairly took all of this biased blame/judgement from a handful of neighborhood karens.
tl;dr version: my neighbor publicly shamed me on our neighborhood facebook group because i let my dog on her yard dig into a gopher hole.
AITA? additionally is my neighbor the asshole for the way she handled this?
Yeah idk, that was crazy rude of you. Dogs are gonna dig but it’s up to YOU to make sure that’s not on anyone else’s property.
Yeah you’re an asshole
I believe nobody ever gets caught the first time they do something wrong… whether it’s speeding, running a red light or something similar.
I hardly believe this is the first time your dog has done something rude to someone else’s lawn.
YTA
YTA
Keep your dogs off other people’s property. There is no excuse for allowing your animal to dig in someone else’s yard. That is basic courtesy as a pet owner.
More people need to be put on blast for behavior like this. At least you made it right, so you at least have that going for you. However, I doubt you would have if it hadn’t been publicized.
NAH because the neighbor was rightfully upset, and you took responsibility and did your best to make it right.
However – your story changed a bit – from “I was distracted so he dug for a minute” to “I thought the yard wasn’t maintained so he dug for a minute”.
It’s really not up to you to decide if the damage is “not that bad”, your dog doesn’t belong in other people’s yards – and shouldn’t get an opportunity to dig, poop, or anything else on other people’s property.
Mistakes happen, but now that you know it *is* a big deal to this neighbor (and others, sounds like from the comments), be more careful and don’t let your dog on other property.
YTA. You let your dog dig up someone else’s property. Doesn’t matter whether you felt it was maintained or not, doesn’t matter whether it was a quick fix. You let your pet damage property. The end.
YTA. A whole minute? That’s not acceptable, a dog can do serious damage to something or someone in that time.
YTA. I currently have two dogs and have owned dogs my entire life. NEVER have I ever let them dig ANYWHERE but especially NOT the neighbor’s yard. It doesn’t matter how maintained or not her property was you don’t let your dog destroy someone’s property. You said it took all of 5 seconds to fix so then why didn’t you fix it when you realized your dog did it? I hope you also pick up your dog’s poop. As a dog owner, I loathe when other dog owners let their dogs be destructive or don’t clean up after them as it gives us all a bad name. I think you deserved this public shaming.
YTA. You need to control your dog. In 25 years of having dogs I’ve never let them do anything like that in someone else’s yard.
YTA. You wouldn’t have been asshole if your dog had started digging and immediately stopped it. But being so distracted that he was able to go at it for a minute is just being a bad dog owner.
Are you the asshole for letting your dog dig someone else’s yard. Are we really asking this???
YTA. Pay attention to what your dog is doing when you’re out with him. You’re the kind of dog owner everyone hates.
YTA and you deserved the public shaming. You literally just stood there while your dog dug a hole on someone else’s property and then walked away like nothing happened. You might think that your ‘fix’ was easy, but I guarantee you the moment it rains that hole your dog dug will be back and bigger. The gopher holes are nothing compared to dog digouts and that’s the kind of hole that people step in and break ankles.
Since it was on their property they’d be held liable for anyone hurting themselves on something your dog did. Yes, YTA!
>i feel like she was super manipulative to claim i damaged her property then to post the photo of me and my dog
Here’s a tip: if you get more upset over people calling out your behavior, than you do about being the one who did the behavior, you’re probably not a good person.
YTA. You let your dog damage someone’s property, then walked away and did nothing to fix it until a bunch of people shamed you for it.
And instead of talking to the person directly, you left a message on FB so you could… what? Broadcast what a good person you are?