HB1133

Hon. Members of the Committee on Environment and Agriculture, This bill is unreasonable regarding barking. First, as a predator is likely to flee at the first hint of human presence, how does one document the presence of a predator unless one is lucky enough to for the critter to be posing for a picture. Second, barking is what dogs do. This bill is contrary to RSA 466:31 (The RSA it references for penalty) which prohibits dog barking more than 30 min, unless the dog is working livestock, including guarding) in which case the dog is allowed to bark longer than 30 min. The proposed bill makes the barking time for dogs guarding livestock less than than for dogs not guarding livestock. Hon. Dan Itse

This bill was obviously submitted by someone who has no idea of how livestock guardian dogs (LGDs) operate. LGDs are mostly defensive dogs. Their job is to keep predators away. This is why they bark. They smell, hear, and sometimes see things that people cannot and they deem it a threat to the livestock they are protecting. They bark to let the livestock know that a predator is near and they bark to let the predator know that they smell, hear, or see them. I cannot tell you how many times I hear a pack of coyotes yipping together but when my dogs start barking, the coyotes go quiet. There are a couple of the real corkers in this bill: 1. "It occurs repeatedly between the hours of 10:00 p.m. and 6:00 a.m. without documented predator activity" - I don't know where you live, but where I live there are predators galore: coyotes, foxes, bobcats, fisher cats, etc. - there is no "documented predator activity" because there is always predator activity and it would be a full time job to "document" it all. 2. "It continues for more than 10 consecutive minutes without the presence of a predator or livestock distress" - ummm - who determines whether there is a predator present? As I mentioned earlier LGDs (and dogs in general), have far more sensitive smell and hearing than people do. So do I pull the dogs off duty because some poorly thought out law with a 10 minute timer has expired or do I trust them that they know when the predator is no longer hanging around? I trust them to know their business better than the folks in Concord. In addition, I already register my dog with the town. There are already laws about nuisance barking. Why is this an issue? Why was this bill brought up? Why single out LGDs. On my road, I hear dogs barking (often for longer than 10 minutes) from half a dozen different properties who are not LGDs. So the solution is to create more poorly thought out laws? Please do not support this bill. Please do not waste your constituents time on bills like these. Thank you.

Stop with government overreach. This is an agricultural state.

I have a Great Pyrenees LGD in training. She is 1.5 years old and is primarily in our house at night until she is old enough to fully do her job (around 2 years old). She is like a member of the family, and loves our kids and animals. We have Nigerian dwarf goats and chickens and hope to add sheep to our farm in the future. We depend on our dog to help keep coyotes, bears, bobcats, and other predators at bay. Livestock guardian dogs help many farmers with peace of mind for their livestock and giving the dogs a fulfilling purpose in life. Restricting their ability to protect livestock and their property makes it harder for farmers who are already struggling. In a nearby town there was a case of goats and sheep being attacked and killed by a bear last summer and it is devastating to lose livestock. Personally I have had a lot of predators attack and kill several chickens in the past which was another reason we decided to invest our time in training a Great Pyr for the LGD purpose. Thank you for your time!

This is an outrageous attack on working dogs who are critical to farming and homesteading. Do not prevent families from providing for themselves through livestock and gardening who rely on these dogs to protect their farms and homesteads.

This bill is not a bill just limiting guardian dogs. It is a bill that inhibits small scale agriculture and homesteading. It is a bill that inhibits our self sufficiency and food independence. Please consider your neighbors right to provide food for your community.

As a farmer, I oppose this bill. This bill seems to place undue constraints on farmers who are struggling to keep their livestock safe from predators. At times we are able to determine what predator caused our dog to alert - tracks in the snow, an image on a trail camera. However when the ground is frozen and snow isn’t fresh tracks can be impossible to find and cameras can’t possibly capture every angle or viewpoint in our pastures. A small weasel can take out many chickens but is difficult to see on video footage due to its small size or ability to sneak in outside of the view of security cameras. Please oppose this bill and put more thought into how you can support small local farms and their LGD’s as they partner to protect the livestock that represent their family’s livelihood.

Hello, my name is Kyle Trombas and I’m in opposition of this bill. I plan on starting a hobby farm soon and would be using livestock guardian dogs to protect the assets I choose to have on my property. This bill limit the number of dogs you can have per acre, with a minimum of 5 acres for 2 dogs. Many people, including myself, don’t have 5 or more acres and only having 1 dog isnt ideal. They are pack animals and we would need 2 minimum so they don’t get outnumbered or hurt by predators. How are we going to prove what the dogs are barking at if they use their sense of smell, which is far beyond what we could even think of smelling. Barking the main deterrent and overall goal of a LGD since we don’t want our dogs getting hurt or wild animals being injured. Having these dogs protects both farmer and wildlife. This bill would put unjust burdens on farmers in a right to farm state.

I own a Great Pyrenees who is a livestock guardian dog (LGD). These dogs have one job, to protect the livestock. In order to do so, they MUST bark. If they hear anything within hearing distance they will bark to ward off any potential threat to the animals they are protecting. Not everyone can have cameras set up around their property to proof of each and every time they bark. What this bill does not take into account is if a neighbor is being petty and decides to call and complain then the owner is at jeopardy of loosing their dog, who is doing his/her job protecting the livestock. These dogs were literally bred to bark at potential threats and to penalize the owner for protecting their livelihood isn’t right, especially with how many residents are farmers. Not all prey back off with flashing lights and annoying noises, and the LDG should be allowed to do its job without having to prove every single bark. I personally think this bill is outrageous and either needs to be re-written for specific instances, or be removed altogether.

Livestock guardian dogs are essential parts of our agricultural system. Limiting these dogs will limit our farming ability. If you don’t want the sounds that come with living in an agricultural community, don’t move there. If you understand the benefits of the barking, it is a small price to pay for livestock security and assets savings.

My name is Shannon O’Brien, my family owns a grass-fed lamb farm in Stratham, NH. We currently employ two livestock guardian dogs on the farm who live full-time with the sheep on pasture. In the fall of 2021 our flock was attacked by coyotes and we lost 45% of our livestock over a 5 night period. Since adding the dogs to our pasture, we have not had an event like this since. Having livestock guardian dogs has allowed us to coexist with the coyotes and other predators, instead of exterminating them and therefore destroying the natural balance of the ecosystem. If NH HB1133 is passed, our dogs’ first line defense against predators- barking- will be criminalized and they will not be able to perform their job, this will eventually cause our farm to lose enough livestock to shut our operations down. Please support the most ecological and ethical method of predator control and do not pass NH HB1133.

I respectfully oppose New Hampshire House Bill 1133 (2026). While the bill attempts to define and regulate livestock guardian dogs, it does not fully account for the practical realities of how these dogs function in agricultural settings. Livestock guardian dogs must be able to move freely and run at large in order to effectively deter predators, which do not operate on predictable schedules. There are no specific hours when threats are more or less likely to occur, making time-based containment requirements unrealistic and potentially dangerous for livestock. At the same time, the requirement to prove livestock ownership or specialized training is vague and easily subject to inconsistent enforcement, leaving room for confusion among municipalities and animal control officers. Imposing rigid statutory standards while relying on unclear qualification criteria risks both undermining legitimate agricultural operations and creating uneven application of the law. Rather than enacting broad statewide language that may conflict with real-world farming practices, lawmakers should pursue more flexible, locally informed solutions that truly support agricultural needs while maintaining clear, consistent, and enforceable standards.

To deny the use of guardian livestock dogs is irresponsible and dangerous. My dog has not only kept my animals safe from bobcats and other predators, but he also kept my children safe while I was working and our neighbor, while under the influence, trespasses on our property and was trying to get into our home. The dogs are irreplaceable. Setting such boundaries will hurt local farms and homesteads. Stop forcing us to depend on a faulty and unreliable government System!

I 100% oppose this bill. I currently own 2 Livestock Guardian dogs who work diligently to protect our livestock and my young children. My wife and invested in these LGDs when were were losing chickens and Guinea fowl to multiple predators. The Chickens provide both meat and eggs for my family and the Guinea fowl also pr9vide eggs but most importantly they eat bugs and mostly ticks that carry lime disease. Before we invested in the LGDs, we would lose close to 15 or more birds a year. We also had bear coming into the yard trying to break into the coops. For the last 4 years those numbers have dropped significantly to almost 0. When the dogs are working during the night we they are keeping these predators away from the property. You may not see these predators but the dogs know they are there. I have set up cellular trail cameras in common spots where these predators travel and have captured pictures of Coyotes, fox, bobcat, and bear. Most of the time my dogs bark along their boundaries that I have set with expensive GPS collars. Those collars also keep the dogs on our property. Implementing a policy where you would have to prove there is a predator out there while the dogs are barking is almost impossible. I have set those cameras up and have been lucky to catch those predators but I would have to spend a fortune on cameras just to watch my entire property. My LGDs are purebred anatolian shepherds and have the instincts to do their jobs without human intervention. I've first hand witnessed them working and chasing off predators. Imposing noise/nuisance violations will only hurt the NH small farmer and families that rely on their livestock to live.

This proposal is ridiculous overreach by lawmakers.

While I believe that registering dogs as livestock guardian dogs with registration would be appropriate, I do not feel that the measures laid out in the bill which would penalize or determine nuisance dogs are appropriate, and therefore I am against this bill.

LGDs bark at unseen dangers to livestock. Their instinct is to ward off predation.. you can not own LGDs without them barking.

Hello, my name is Emily Herrera and we moved here last summer to start our independent farmstead in Belmont, New Hampshire. I am writing in opposition to the proposed bill that would restrict the use of Livestock Guardian Dogs (LGDs) in our state. As a Right-to-Farm state, New Hampshire has long recognized the importance of protecting agricultural practices that are essential to farm viability. Livestock Guardian Dogs are not pets, they are working animals, bred strategically for generations and trained specifically to protect livestock from predators. On our farm, our Great Pyrenees and Anatolian-Pyrenees are a critical part of our operation. Without them, we would face significant and ongoing losses from coyotes, foxes, bobcats, bears, feral dogs, and predatory birds native to our region. Guarding livestock is their job. Barking is one of the primary tools they use to do that job. It is a preventive measure — a warning that keeps predators away before livestock are harmed. Our LGD’s establish a perimeter around our property making clear that predators will be challenged. Requiring farmers to justify or “prove” each instance of barking fails to recognize the fundamental nature of how these dogs work, and also places an undue burden on the farmers to now purchase trail cameras or set traps to prove predatory activity. The working radius of LGD’s can effectively reduce predator activity for miles, and offer a mutual benefit to neighbors with backyard poultry, small pet dogs, or indoor/outdoor cats as well. If LGD’s are prevented from doing their job effectively, using their natural range and barking, small farm operations like ours will suffer devastating losses and means that we will lose livestock that feed our family and our community. Without proper protection, we won’t have livestock — we will have deadstock. This bill would not only harm our independent farmstead, but would also put many small and family farms across New Hampshire at risk. Livestock Guardian Dogs are a humane, non-lethal, and widely accepted method of predator control. Restricting their use undermines both animal welfare and the sustainability of local agriculture. Moreover, any legislative definitions of livestock guardian dogs should define them as working dogs and should be allowed to register them as such, and also allow for exemptions from dog license fees as they are not pets they are a critical component to farm operation. As pack animals, often 2 or more LGD’s patrol areas of 5-10 acres, with more dogs required to maintain safety on larger parcels. Also, these dogs are most active at night and may utilize persistent barking to keep predators at bay, so farmers should not be penalized with fines or burden of proof due to the nature of these working dogs. I respectfully urge you to oppose this bill and to stand with New Hampshire’s farming community. Protecting our ability to use Livestock Guardian Dogs is essential to preserving the future of agriculture in our state. Thank you.

As a livestock owner, the need and function of livestock guardian dogs is essential to successfully operating my farm. This bill is significant government overreach to take action against the small number of people who do not properly contain their livestock guard dogs or train them effectively. We have put countless time dollars into proper training and support to ensure our farm runs a quality operation in the interest of protecting our assets - the livestock. While our farm is on more than 10 acres and the bill exempts us from much of the government overreach, I am opposed to this for the sake of other farmers who are operating on smaller parcels. This is another bill that impedes farming and negatively impacts livelihoods of so many New Hampshire residents.

Our family participates in small-scale agriculture by raising livestock on our farm in Belknap County. Our livestock guardian dogs are not pets, and they are not merely a convenience. They are a critical line of defense for our animals, and they operate on a level of threat perception that no human can replicate or fully understand. That is not a weakness in our system. That is the entire point. One night our dog barked for a long stretch and we called him off repeatedly but he continued to return to bark. From our side of the fence there was nothing to see, no movement, no obvious threat. It was not until the next day that a neighbor told us he had been watching on the other side (his side) of our fence and watched coyotes moving along the perimeter while our dog tracked and warned them off. Our dog knew something we did not. Without a witness account or without any way to document what was happening in the dark on the other side of a fence, that night could have been a punishable offense under this bill. Our dog would have been penalized for doing his job perfectly. This is not unusual. Our dogs consistently bark at one specific delivery truck that comes by almost daily while ignoring every other truck of similar size. We believe it is something in the engine or brakes, a frequency outside normal human hearing range, that our dogs register as a threat. We did not train them to make that distinction. They made it on their own. We have also watched our dogs lie down quietly near sick animals before we had any indication that something was wrong. These animals perceive a world we cannot fully access, and that perception is inseparable from their value. Which brings me to the central problem with this bill. It assumes that the behavior it wants to restrict can be modified while leaving the dog's core function intact. It cannot. You cannot train a livestock guardian dog to ignore predator threats and still have a livestock guardian dog. That instinct is not a bad habit. It is the entire reason the animal exists. Attempting to condition it away does not produce a quieter working dog. It produces an expensive, large dog that stands by while your livestock are at risk. The bark is not a side effect of the job. The bark is inherently a part of the job. In researching the instincts of livestock guardian dogs, you will find that urinating around a perimeter and barking strategically are two ways that these dogs work so that they do not have to fight off a predator. Fighting is typically their last resort, but functions such as barking typically help keep most predators at bay. This bill is built on a fundamental misunderstanding of what these animals are, and every specific provision reflects that misunderstanding. Mandatory LGD registration singles out farms unfairly. Requiring farms to register a dog specifically as a livestock guardian dog creates a tiered class of animal ownership that targets agricultural operations for special scrutiny and restriction. This country has a painful history of legislation that singled out specific groups for separate treatment, and that history should make us cautious about any law that marks one segment of our community for a different set of rules. Farms are active contributors to our local economy and our agricultural heritage. Placing undue burdens on them does not just affect farm families like ours, it affects everyone who depends on local food production and rural land stewardship. This is a slippery slope, and farmers should not be the ones standing at the bottom of it. The definition of "predator" is unworkable. As in my example of the delivery truck, the bill does not account for any of this, and it cannot, because the range of what a livestock guardian dog perceives as a threat is precisely what makes them effective. You cannot legislate a list comprehensive enough to cover what these animals already know instinctively. The burden of proof is placed on the wrong party. Requiring a farm owner to document every instance of predator presence in order to defend against a complaint is not realistic. As my own story illustrates, the threat is often invisible to us. That is not negligence. That is the nature of predator activity and the nature of what these dogs do. Barking cadence is never defined. Is the limit per dog or per property? If one dog barks for eight minutes and another picks up for eight minutes, is that a violation? The bill does not say, which makes enforcement arbitrary and opens farms to complaints that cannot be consistently or fairly adjudicated. This bill conflicts with existing law. RSA 466:31.II.(b) explicitly exempts dogs guarding, working, or herding livestock from the sustained barking provision. That exemption exists because legislators already recognized that livestock guardian dogs operate differently and serve a function that cannot be held to the same standard as a neighborhood pet. Applying a tighter restriction to the exact use case the existing law protected undermines the clear and deliberate intent of that exemption. The current law already handles this correctly. RSA 466:31.II.(b) protects livestock guardian dogs rather than restricting them, and that is exactly where the law should remain. I do not support HB1133 in any form, and I ask you to oppose it entirely and without compromise. Respectfully, Kara Carrero

I've worked as a dog behavior consultant since 2009, helping owners with various breeds, including guardian types. I oppose HB 1133 as introduced. Key points: • LGDs are hardwired to bark as a primary deterrent—it's not trainable out like obedience issues. • The "trained or in training" clause is problematic; few (if any) NH trainers offer formal LGD certification, and instincts drive the behavior more than certificates. • Barking thresholds/fines could unfairly penalize small/home farms relying on nighttime protection, especially with predator pressure in rural NH. • Current exemption works for most legitimate users; add education/mediation instead of new regs that might discourage farming or lead to more relinquishments. • Middle ground: Voluntary best practices (e.g., acreage buffers, neighbor outreach), incentives for bark management tools, or better enforcement of existing nuisance laws without carving out special categories. This bill risks hurting the small producers it aims to help while not addressing root causes like unprepared owners or sprawl conflicts.

Stop restricting farmers

As a resident of rural NH and an owner of a livestock guardian dog I am firmly OPPOSED to this bill. Any residence that is zoned for farm or farm animals should have the right to own LGDs to protect their stock. Barking and patrolling is indeed the job of a LGD and they need to be allowed to do their job in order to protect the stock. It should be the job of the homeowner to review the area their home is zoned for if they are going to have a problem with the normal day to day functions of a working farm or homestead. The animals and their owners should not be penalized for homeowners or renters not doing their research to understand the area their home is zoned for.

While well-intentioned, this bill would undermine the very purpose of livestock guardian dogs and create unintended consequences for small farms, homesteads, and rural property owners across New Hampshire. Livestock guardian dogs are not pets in the traditional sense. They are working animals, bred and trained over generations to protect livestock from predators—a job that occurs primarily at night, when coyotes, bears, foxes, and other threats are most active. Restricting their ability to work during those hours directly compromises livestock safety and increases the risk of loss for farmers. Strict enforcement standards—particularly those that limit movement, barking, or nighttime activity—interfere with the dog’s natural guarding behavior. Barking, patrolling, and responding to perceived threats are core deterrents, not nuisances. Imposing penalties or operational limits effectively neuters the dog’s role, shifting risk and cost back onto the farmer. New Hampshire is a rural state with active farms, homesteads, and working lands. Applying suburban or residential expectations to agricultural settings fails to recognize this reality. Many farms are located in areas where predator pressure is increasing, and livestock guardian dogs often serve as the only non-lethal, effective line of defense. This bill also raises concerns about enforcement overreach. Requiring rigid compliance standards invites complaint-driven enforcement, where working dogs could be penalized simply for doing their job. That is not compatible with the “Live Free or Die” principle that values personal responsibility, property rights, and minimal interference in lawful agricultural practices. Rather than imposing broad restrictions, policy should: • Recognize livestock guardian dogs as essential agricultural tools • Provide clear exemptions for working farms • Focus on education and neighbor-to-neighbor resolution, not punishment • Balance rural realities with reasonable consideration for surrounding properties Protecting livestock, supporting small farmers, and respecting New Hampshire’s rural heritage should not be sacrificed for one-size-fits-all regulations. This bill, as written, risks doing exactly that.