What's your dog (or cat's) nemesis?

[circa1978]

Our girl dog (2.5) has a serious beef with the ice cream truck. She can hear it well before anyone else and we know it is coming because she has a very specific bark/growl she uses the entire time it is near. She always looks so pleased when it leaves and is totally convinced she saved us all from overpriced treats.

[litebright]

Ground hogs.

She is interested in all kinds of creatures, but in a normal, want-to-chase-them kind of way. Groundhogs make her back-fur stand up and they are the only creature that she barks at. Not just barks, but like, growl-barks in very much a "I WOULD KILL YOU IF I COULD" ferocious way. She doesn't react that way to any other animal (and we see a decent variety in our neighborhood) but for some reason she absolutely freaks out when she sees a ground hog.

[starburst604]

My lab will often growl at and not want to move toward men who are wearing hats, especially if they’re pulled down on the face some. I think he likes to be able to fully see the eyes and face to evaluate people. He also hates my stick vacuum and will attack the stick part and lose his mind like it’s attacking him. But if I remove the stick and just use the barrel and a nozzle, he doesn’t care. This really makes cleaning up the constant fur a good time. 🤦‍♀️

[expectantsteelerfan]

The garbage truck, and then by association the outdoor garbage cans, and any truck that sounds like it might be the garbage truck.

[emilyinchile]

My previous dog HATED guitars. We got her off the street, so our thinking was that maybe someone with a guitar abused her, but just seeing someone walking by with a guitar case set her off. Forget about live music, she was not having it. Even if someone she knew and loved held a guitar she would start barking at them. She got over a lot of her initial fears/dislikes but never that one.

[deadwing]

Older dog: humans on wheels (bikes, skateboards, roller blades, wheelchairs, etc). My theory is she knows human heads should bob a little when we move, but when using wheels the head stays much steadier and it freaks her out.

Younger dog: bunnies. No bunny is safe in my yard anymore.

[devonpow]

the mail. Not the mail person just the mail. We have a mail slot in our door and she attacks it as it’s pushed through

[SwimDeep]

All three of our cats hate the lawn crew that comes through the neighborhood once a week. Especially the mower. A couple of years ago the mower threw a rock into our front storm door and completely shattered the glass. It was a mess to clean up and ever since they all go upstairs when they hear lawn equipment.

Also, there is an inside/outside orange tom (unfixed) that likes to come say hi sometimes. My orange cat HATES him. Last time he came by I thought my boy would break the window 😳

[waverly]

Our dog barks and growls at airplanes. She has gotten a little better over time. I’m always telling her calm down it’s just an airplane. Also, large birds like vulture types.

[sarahsays]

My dog cares about nothing.

The cats hate my house cleaner. I think it is because she has a backpack style vacuum and it freaks them out.

[leahcar]

My Great Dane mix is the world’s biggest chicken. He is absolutely terrified of lizards- like the tiny 2” ones. He screams when he spots one. Not barks. Screams. It’s something.

My Rat Terrier has a very long list. He attacks the lawn mower, birds, any rodents…. He also slaps the robot vacuum if it gets too close to him.

[rubytue]

Amazon man youtu.be/fRXlfIE8Flw?si=_rxSbSxWpmDs7-H5

Or really, any vehicle larger than a car. Or a cat on our back deck. Or any four legged creature, including strollers, which have four “legs” touching the ground. Basically, she is a JRT

[jamie.1022]

The dark.

When she goes out back at night she will stay on the deck and bark in all directions with her hair standing up until she thinks she’s scared away whatever lurks in the yard.

[litasail]

Anybody who delivers anything to our house.

[ssmjlm]

The doorbell. She barks like she’s twice her 40lb size. Thank you DH for not running off your ring alerts, so she hears that and gets ready.

Wheeling the trash and recycle bins.

[isabel]

Delivery people and anyone who comes to fix something in our house. These are mostly men, but she does not bark at the dads who come to our door to pick up their kids from play dates, so it’s not exclusively a man thing.

[UMaineTeach]

We had a dog who didn’t care about all the delivery trucks and semis going by, but UPS trucks must die.

[katfco]

My cat hates anyone who comes in our house with shoes, especially workmen and their heavy boots.

[heygrey]

The elderly little dogs (mostly pugs!) our neighbour fosters. There is a rotating cast of characters, but the little dogs bark on their side of the fence and she paces and snorts and barks on our side of the fence. She loves the neighbour people (the man sneaks her treats if he's outside), but those yappy little dogs drive her insane.


There was also a man that lives two streets away and we'd often see him on our morning walk while he was leaving for work. She would bark and bristle and turn me around to walk a different direction. We know she was in a house where she wasn't treated nicely before she came to us, so I wonder if he looks like a man she knew.

[erbear]

There is a Fox that rolls around my hood and my dog HATES that thing.

[mccallister84]

There are a couple of foxes that run through the yard behind us. And sometimes through our yard. Man she goes crazy. I’m kind of amazed (from inside the house with the windows closed) she knows they aren’t just another dog.

[cjcouple]

These 4 little yorkshire terriers who live next door that are brought out together (2 each on split leashes) and bark at everything. Then they start fighting each other.

My dog barks every single day he sees them outside. they don't seem very nice. only dogs in the area we don't play with. there are 5 other dogs around here and my pup gets along with all of them. Except those 4 little ankle biters.

[expatjen]

My 12lbs poodle hates anything and everything - the people walking down the road, the mailman’s truck, the neighbours, the pigeons that fly by. It’s annoying because he’ll hear something, then bark, and that sets off the German shepherd. So she starts barking and she has no idea what’s going on, so she’ll still be barking even when the poodle has lost interest and has gone back to napping. 🙄

[mrsukyankee]

Anyone she doesn't know who wants to come into the house or talk to us from outside the house. He also hates motorcycles, scooters and skateboarders due to the sound. Funnily enough, he is fine with other loud sounds including the fire engine blaring (found that out while walking next to the fire station, which is one block away).

[Susie]

My 11 year old girl golden retriever:  mourning doves.  She caught and killed several in her heyday, which is hilarious because she's otherwise the softest, sweetest, gentlest marshmallow I've ever known.  None of our other dogs have any kills to her name, but she has a list.  

My 1 year old boy golden:  Does it move?  It's a nemesis.  Fed Ex truck.  UPS.  Amazon.  People walking by.  Dogs walking by.  Leaves falling.  My favorite thing to watch him chase though is flies that get in the house.  Drives him bonkers.  Once he even got a butterfly.  No idea how.

[bcv513]

The ticking clock on 60 minutes. She could be sound asleep in the furthest corner of the house. That clock starts ticking and she would freak out, running, barking, spinning, etc. We used to joke that she thought it was her biological clock ticking.

[followyourarrow]

The neighbors have an outdoor cat that I swear likes to torture Finn. The cat will intentionally stop in front of our window and poo in our lawn.

[circa1978]

Sept 30, 2024 8:15:33 GMT -5 bcv513 said:

The ticking clock on 60 minutes. She could be sound asleep in the furthest corner of the house. That clock starts ticking and she would freak out, running, barking, spinning, etc. We used to joke that she thought it was her biological clock ticking.

Love this one. I think it's a sound thing for our girl too. The ice cream truck in question has this weird mechanical voice that says "hello!" every so often and she's clearly convinced it's the devil. No other truck or sound does that to her, and every deer, dog, bird or creature is a friend. New people get a "hey, it's a person!" bark, and she has a different sort of alert "boof" for unknown dangers, like a scratching sound of a tree against a window at night or something. The ice cream truck though? That is a absolute no, never, hate situation.

[mommyatty]

Our newest cat has a frenemy. As in, he holds out hope as only an orange cat rarely in control of the one brain cell all orange cats share, can that a cat who sees him as an enemy will be his friend. There’s a tiny black cat (maybe 6 pounds) that we have been feeding for years. We call him Loki. Loki is feral, not neutered, and territorial. Phineas is gigantic (15 pounds of muscle), neutered, and firmly believes that Loki is a friend who just doesn’t know it yet. And we regularly have to run outside to save Phineas from getting the ever loving shit beat out of him because he chirps and meows and tries to rub up against Loki who is having none of it.

[underwaterrhymes]

Our girl dog HATES the vacuum, fireworks, loud trucks, when someone is loudly walking around upstairs and she is downstairs , and thunderstorms. Loud noises are scary. She also despises little dogs when we are out walking. And she is not a fan of water either.

Our boy dog doesn’t like joggers, people on bikes, and other dogs besides his sister.

Our boy cat isn’t afraid of anything. He’s a total asshole, but he rolls with everything.

Our girl cat hates people who are not us. She tolerates the dogs and does not like our boy cat, which means we have to keep them separated. (We periodically swap them out during the day and are working on at least getting them to tolerate each other.)