At that point you become legally responsible for their well being during their trip across your lawn, and when one of them deliberately trips and “injures” themself, they can sue you for every penny you have, because the USA is like that.
Then again, if someone gets injured fleeing the sprinklers, the owner is also on the hook for that.
Really, a simple hedge or fence would be a better solution that cost less and requires less effort. Save the motion sensing water canons for squirrels getting into the bird feeders or things like that.
It also supposes that after creating a path across the lawn that people will stay on it. Trust me, they won’t. This is a common issue now with a lot of variations, including people who let their pets poop on other people’s lawns and don’t clean it up. The idea that the person with the lawn is the one causing the problem seems very close to the folks complaining about the driver whose car got hit in this story:
Even if it was, I doubt that squirting people with water and recording their reactions, then playing it back publicly with silly music as a form of amusement, is an especially strong legal defense mechanism. Whether they were faking it or not, a slip and injury caused by unexpectedly getting sprayed with water and subjected to loud noise seems far more likely than by just walking across a dry, flat lawn.
I remember when I was in 1st or 2nd grade when I would walk home from school I’d typically go about 3 feet from the road into the grass so I, you know, wouldn’t have to walk on the road. I probably cut some corners as well.
One time this older lady was cleaning her storm door and yelled at me. I didn’t hear her and asked, “What?”
She opens the door and said, “Hit the street!”
Oh… uh… ok. I think that was the first time a non-related adult yelled at me.
While I probably wouldn’t walk across this guy’s lawn, if I did and got sprayed and scared by an alarm, my next trip across it would include a squeeze bottle full of Roundup. Yes, I can be a vindictive asshole, and I’m fine with it.
Related: we had a problem with trekkers hiking through our vineyard and picking the wine grapes. The solution was a sign: “These are wine grapes. They don’t taste good. Go to the end of the row and there are two vines of table grapes. Help yourself there.”
As others have said, the solution while amusing is incredibly wasteful and is a step or two past passive aggressive. It’s vindictive. Just put up a hedge or fence.
Do you have an HOA? Are there any reasons preventing you from putting up some plants around the property to discourage people from cutting across?
A+ to me for reading comprehension. Although i do wonder if you’re able to petition the neighborhood or municipality to put speed bumps or anything to make the area safer? I had an ex-coworker that did that because people kept speeding past his corner.
I set one up to protect a patch of sod in my backyard from raccons. They are exceptionally good at rolling the sod back up to get grubs. Unfortunately they are smart enough to accurately map and roll up the areas not covered by the motion sensor…
I would never go after people intentionally (its just grass…) but I do keep dreaming of ways to discourage the people that walk their dog into our garden and let them dig up plants… Perhaps adjusting the sensor to detect the dog, spray the person
