09/13/2020
This post is in response to the hateful and malicious comments I have been receiving about the recent dog shooting that took place on our farm. I was accused of “shooting a little puppy that was staring at our animals through the fence”. This is not at all what happened. I want the truth to be told of what really happened and why I felt compelled to take an animal’s life. I love nature! All of it, both animals and plants. Anyone who knows me will attest to that. The animals I own, and our farm are good examples of my stewardship.
My wife and I have been raising Miniature Zebu cattle for over 15 years. Many of the more than 200 calves born on our farm have been bottle raised. They are quite special to us.
Our entire 10-acre farm is fenced with 4’ high wire field fence and barbed wire on top. All entrances have 7-rail pipe gates. A coyote might be able to jump the fence but we felt pretty secure that roaming dogs would be kept out. We had noticed a neighbor’s dogs running freely quite often. This summer I began noticing footprints in the sand right around our barns. On the mornings when I noticed them, my cattle would be nervous and didn’t want to come into the barn for their morning feeding. I suspected that it was coyote prints I was seeing. Then, one morning I noticed some prints that were quite large and wondered if dogs had gotten onto our property somehow and were actually coming into our open barn. If they were dogs, I was pretty sure which neighbor they belonged to. I tried calling him several times but got no answer and his voice mailbox was full. So, I made a visit to his farm. The owner was not there but I spoke to a couple farm employees about a possible dog problem. They told me that they would tell the owner.
A couple more weeks went by and my wife and I were awakened about 4am by very loud barking in front of our house. I ran out onto the porch and saw three dogs in our front southwest pasture with our cattle. Because our front security light shines into the field, I was able to see a large white dog, a medium sized reddish-brown dog, and a smaller one, white with gray spots. I yelled and they immediately ran off. Now, I knew for sure whose dogs they were. I am still surprised that they were able to get onto our property. Somehow, they had been getting through or over the 7-rail pipe gates because I had checked all the perimeter wire fencing and there was no place they could get through or under it. Later that morning I went to the neighbor’s house. There was no answer when I knocked at the front door, but three dogs came from around the house, barking at me. They were the same three that I saw at 4AM in my front pasture. The big white dog was rather intimidating with his loud barking and hair standing up on his back. I went over to the farm office and spoke to the lady working there. I told her that I needed to talk to the owner because we had a dog problem. She said he was not there but she would text him to call me ASAP. She did inform me that she was aware of the situation about the dogs. The owner did call me later that day. I said “We have a dog problem”. I told him what had been happening over the last couple months and what had taken place that morning. I was certain they were his dogs. I said that I was very concerned for the safety of my animals. They had been harassing my adult cattle but had not injured any. I was deeply concerned about this fall when we were going to have newborns. Any newborn calves being bottle raised would be totally defenseless without their mothers there to protect them. I went on to tell the owner several times that I did not want to shoot his dogs but if they kept coming onto my property, I would. I expected the owner to take this seriously and say he would address the problem. To my surprise, his answer was, “Well, I guess if they are on your property, you can shoot them”. That’s how our conversation ended. He voiced no concern about the well-being of any of his dogs, big or small.
I must mention a very heartbreaking tragedy that happened earlier this year which will also explain my resolve to shoot these dogs if they continued to get onto my property and harass my animals. We sold three cows to a lady in Dade City. Amazingly, all three of them had heifer calves out of one of our master champion show bulls. She wanted very tame, manageable Mini Zebus that she could take in the show ring. So, she decided to bottle raise them. She had not raised cattle before and was absolutely taken with them. They became such loveable pets to her. Two of them were born by state fair time in February and she and our grandson showed them there. After they were weaned this spring, she went out one morning to do chores and to her horror, found two of them mauled to death and the other one barely breathing. She carried the third one into her barn and called her vet. But it died in her arms before her vet could get there. These three calves were slaughtered by a neighbor’s dogs that had somehow gotten out of their fenced yard that night.
With this tragedy in mind and my neighbor telling me to go ahead and shoot them, I knew what I had to do if his dogs came over again some night. Well, it wasn’t night time when they next showed up. About a week later in the middle of the afternoon I heard dogs barking behind our house. I grabbed my shotgun and as I went out the side door I saw the reddish-brown dog and the white with gray spotted dog run behind the barn. When I got out there, the spotted one came running back toward me from behind the barn and I shot it. When I went to see where the other dog was, it was already running across the property next door. I watched as it ran to the back of that property and under the fence, then headed back home. These were two of the same dogs I saw at their owner’s house. The big white dog was not with them that afternoon.
The dog I shot was a mature male dog, not a puppy. It appeared to be a Dachshund crossbreed. I took no pleasure in killing this dog and did not choose this particular one. It just happened to be the unfortunate one that came around the barn toward me. If these dogs meant anything to their owners, why would they let them run free to possibly be caught by animal control, hit by a vehicle on the road, or yes, be shot by a neighbor protecting his own animals?
Our newborn Miniature Zebus average around 20 lbs. at birth with some as tiny as 12 lbs. If I had not acted as I did, I believe there was another tragedy in the making once our newborns arrived. I had good reason to shoot any one of these dogs and I did have the legal right to do so.
