Otero County, NM Noise Ordinances: Barking Dogs (2026)

Section 170-2, titled "Barking dogs," makes it unlawful for any owner to allow his dog to bark excessively and thereby disturb the peace and tranquility of others, and separately bars any owner from keeping or maintaining an animal so that it habitually or continuously barks, howls, or otherwise disturbs the peace and quiet of county inhabitants. This section sits inside Chapter 170, Noise, Article I, General Restrictions, adopted by Ord. No. 95-02 in 1995 and amended in its entirety by Ord. No. 96-10 in 1996, and it is enforced by the Sheriff's Office under § 170-3, the same enforcement clause that covers the rest of the article.

Unlike the county's separate Animal Control chapter (Ch. 105), this provision does not require a companion-animal license or turn on the animal's licensing status; it applies to any dog or other animal whose noise disturbs neighbors, regardless of ownership records. The section does not define a specific duration or decibel threshold for "excessive" barking, leaving the determination to the responding deputy based on whether the barking disturbs the peace and tranquility of others in the area. Because § 170-2 falls within the noise chapter rather than the animal-control chapter, a complaint can be pursued as a noise violation even when animal control declines to act on a nuisance-animal basis.