I'm in a rural location. My house is over 1 km back from the road frontage so I have a letterbox and I keep my council wheelie bins at the front gate. Until now that is.
In the past month, my wheelie bin has been stolen twice and last night, an attempt was made to steal it again but I had chained it to the fence post and so, I am guessing out of spite or frustration, the villain/s had tried to hacksaw through the pier of my letter box (a freestanding thing on a leg that's bolted into a concrete footing) but gave up when they hit the star picket I'd put up the centre. So instead they just wrenched the letterbox itself off its pier and took it anyway. But not content with that, took the old bar-fridge I had attached to the letterbox pier and which was my parcel box.
What the devil would someone want with these things anyway? I'm stumped.
And hence my request for suggestions for a vandal-proof and thief-proof letterbox I can build or buy. Any ideas anyone?
Peter
It could also be petty Fijians (inside humour, not a racial slur)
People that got nothing else better to do like graffiti everywhere, can't stand it. They should have their fingers chopped off!
Stefan, you cannot do that to the modern 'artists'...can you?
As for the thieves, I think the best thing to do is to report the incidents to the police and keep bins on the property. Or perhaps you could put a snake to the bin? Or a road kill? Or both? Just kidding!
We had a little more luck, ours came back empty the day after it had vanished the night before collection. Street ferals were the perps, decent mannered bogans.
Really if I were more rural, I would consider hooking up a 'livestock deterent' to the bin and/or letter box. Zap.
I once really went overboard filling our bin , full of dirt and rocks and sheepishly put it out front convinced the council truck wouldn't lift it ,
Through the night i woke up to a crashing sound down the street , I eventually saw a yoof kicking bins over as he wandered up the street then lost sight of him,,then out of the darkness he sprinted with a big flying kick to my bin ,,the sucker didn't move an inch and he fell in a crumpled heap on the road before hobbling off into the night
I reckon Marty is on the right theme Peter, although Ricks solution is tempting (could be a lot of paperwork though if you disintegrate someone??).
Must confess I've often wondered if you'd had letterbox or bin problems coming through the front gate. I haven't been out there since last new moon though. Promise!
There really are some low-lifes in the world, for sure.
I did some investigating in the local area of Peter's property. I strongly suspected from the start and now I am convinced my initial assumptions were correct.
A Yowie family has been thieving and vandalising. They are a protected species. I'll be informing Peter to build a 4 meter high wall and a brick pillar letterbox into it. A special crane to lift the bin over the wall for garbage collectors to be installed.
Attached is a photo of one of the culprits. I was lucky to capture the image as its rare for Yowies to be out during daylight. It indicates that this particular family constitutes rogue members.