Yard fencing with smaller dogs?

[flymetothemoon]

Gizmo (my rescue pup who has ruled the house the last 2 years) is now 2 for 2 on adventures chasing the fox who has a burrow in the open and overgrown land behind our house. So, if you've got a 17 pound, lightning fast, ultimate terrier guard dog who can easily jump 5 foot, what type of fence do you recommend?

[Susie]

Either privacy fence, or plantings blocking the view through a less solid fence, so your dog can't see the fox?  Presumably if he can't see it, he won't chase it.  That seems safer for the dog maybe than getting into an escalation contest over how high you can build and how high he can jump.

[deadwing]

I put in a 6' vinyl privacy fence for my husky mix who was consistently jumping my old picket fence. The nice thing about vinyl is they can't get a toehold on it to try and scramble over. My girl can boing up high enough to peek through the lattice at the top, but that's all. I think if it was wood, she could use the cross bars to get herself over.

Is your dog a digger at all? I'd also be worried about a terrier going under if he couldn't go over.

[mommin]

We have a 17 pounder that fancies himself a hunter. We had a 6-ft fence that he dug under and figured out how to climb. To stop the digging we buried chicken wire along the fence line. Unfortunately, due to the way the fence is built (HOA requirements) we couldn’t stop the climbing.

We ended up getting a PetSafe brand electric fence. We buried it just past the fence line so he can run all the way to the fence before it beeps at him. He knows now that there are different beeping sounds the closer he gets and doesn’t risk it. There are ten shock levels so we made sure to test it before we put it on him. We needed to keep him safe but didn’t want to hurt him to do that. It is very effective.

I know some people have a lot of feelings about the electric fences but it was the only way we could keep him safe while allowing him access to the yard, which he loves.

[brooklyn]

6 ft vinyl fence with fast growing privacy plantings (arborvitae, skip laurels, etc)

[dr.girlfriend]

We replaced a four-foot picket fence with a six-foot fence, and then had to do an electric fence to keep our dog from jumping our six-foot fence. She wasn't climbing, just taking a running start and jumping straight over. We ran the electric fence a few feet inside the physical fence. However, after a few months she stopped trying and we didn't have to keep her in the collar. In retrospect I probably should have tried some cheaper options (they have portable things that trigger the electric collar) to train her away initially. I know the electric fence wire got cut during construction and would require repairs to get it functional again, so it's not even like we have it for a future hyper puppy! We also put paving stones in areas she was digging, and then later was able to repurpose those in our garden. She calmed down significantly over time!

The Criminal:

[mrsukyankee]

dr.girlfriend, your criminal is gorgeous!