How to Stop Dog From Breaking Fence Updated

How to Stop Dog From Breaking Fence

Responsible dog owners go to great pains to brand certain their canine family unit members stay rubber at dwelling house and don't go roaming unescorted around the neighborhood. The risks for a free-roaming dog are legion, including, but not limited to: getting hit by a car, shot past an irate neighbor or a police force officer protecting public prophylactic, attacking or beingness attacked by other animals, beingness picked up by animal control, or just vanishing, never to be seen again. Still some dogs seem hell-bent on escaping – doing everything they tin can think of to get over, under, effectually, or through their humans' containment strategies. What exercise yous practise when y'all have a dog who is dedicated to escaping his yard?

dog jumping tall fence — Felix Renaud | Dreamstime.com

Reasons Dogs Escape

Earlier we even address means to stop your domestic dog from escaping, we demand to examine reasons why your dog may be and so defended to breaking out of your k. If all we do is to block his exits, he may put all his energy into finding new ways out. If nosotros address his motivation for escaping, he may stop trying, or at least non be every bit dedicated to overcoming the new obstacles y'all put in his path.

Boredom in Dogs

Your dog may exist bored. Calculation more mental and physical stimulation to his life and his lawn might help him become more content to stay home. Kiddie wading pools offering a huge variety of entertainment options. If your dog loves water, fill the pool with water for actual wading and splashing fun. For a dog who loves to dig, fill the puddle with dirt or sand and bury toys and treats for him to detect. If y'all don't want the mess of dirt or sand, make full the pool with plastic balls of various sizes and allow him pounce among the assurance looking for his toys and treats. There are now tons of puzzle toys that tin can keep him engaged in his yard; Kong Wobblers and other Kong treat-dispensing toys are some of my favorites.

By the way, speaking of boredom: your dog should non exist left in the grand for long periods of time (long enough to become bored) and should never be left in the backyard all twenty-four hour period (while no one is home) or all night (when he could hands be safely and happily indoors with you lot).

Arousal from Outside Stimuli

Getting stimulated by the sight of exciting things is another reason dogs are driven to escape their yards. Chain link and other livestock-wire fences are the scourge of good dog containment. They are certainly easier on the wallet than a privacy contend, but many dogs are compelled to escape when they are constantly overstimulated and frustrated by seeing a parade of dogs, humans, cars, trucks, motorcycles, skateboarders, bicyclists, mail service carriers, and more passing by their yards. The added danger hither is that an aroused, frustrated dog who escapes is likely to be aggressive when he finally has access to his targets.

If you tin can't install a privacy fence, consider attaching something solid to your wire or chain-link fence and then your dog can no longer see through it.

Male Dogs Looking for Sex

With the current trend to wait longer to sterilize (not a trend I necessarily support, but that's another article), there are more dogs, specially intact male dogs, who are very motivated to escape to court the neighborhood female in flavour. The obvious solution here: neuter.

Canine Anxiety

This category brings upwards a whole unlike course of behavior challenges. Dogs who endure separation or isolation feet or thunder phobia are driven to escape past their panic. Because severely stressed dogs can become destructive, owners sometimes leave these dogs outdoors to avoid impairment to their homes. This is not an acceptable solution, as the panicked dog who escapes is even more likely to run in forepart of moving vehicles, bite someone who tries to aid him, and/or run fast and far away, decreasing chances that he will exist found and returned home.

You must care for the feet, oft with medication as well as beliefs modification protocols, and never leave these dogs lonely outdoors. (Encounter "Relieving a Dog'southward Separation Anxiety," July 2008.)

Dogs But Want to Have Fun

Finally, with a history of reinforcement for escaping, your dog may simply have learned that information technology's nifty fun to run loose, loot garbage cans, chase cats and other pocket-sized animals, play with the neighbor kid, read pee-mail without interruption, romp with other neighborhood dogs, and engage in lots of other forms of canine mischief. Make it more fun for your dog to stay home, and keep on reading for thoughts on how to brand it more difficult for your domestic dog to breach your fence. (Notation that I didn't say incommunicable . . . .)

Management

Now that you understand some of the possible motivations for your dog's obsession with escape, let's talk well-nigh an overall management strategy.

Kickoff things first: If he escapes when y'all exit him in the yard on his own, don't. Yous must e'er be with him in the yard, whether information technology's a cursory potty pause or an extended "enjoy the sunshine" session. If he can escape, even if he doesn't practice it every time, he simply tin can't be trusted by himself. Ever.

If he escapes even when you're watching him, ignoring your calls to come up back as he scrambles over or squeezes under, so he only goes out in the yard on a leash or a long line. Every. Single. Time. Remember, every fourth dimension he gets loose and has fun chasing cats around the neighborhood, visiting his pals and getting into garbage cans, he has been reinforced for escaping, making it more than probable he volition try that much harder to escape the next time.

Yous also need to brand sure anybody in the household is on board with your management plan. It does no healthy to implement scrupulous management if your beloved spouse or offspring blithely open the back door and plow Houdini loose to escape one more than time.

Another important piece of direction is didactics a fail-rubber call up and then if and when he does become out, you can get him back easily without reinforcing his "Take hold of Me If You Tin can" game of keep-away. (Come across "Reliable Recalls", September 2012.) When y'all do become him back, make sure to do something delightfully fun with him so coming dorsum to you doesn't mean the fun is over. Then get-go improving your fence so he can't escape.

Dogs Who Jump Over Fences

Some dogs are aerial artists, sailing over or scaling barriers with the greatest of ease. Although not exclusively, these tend to exist the athletic herding, sporting, and working dogs, likewise as the lean and lithe sighthounds – although some of those niggling terriers can surprise you with their physical abilities. If your dog is going over your fence, you're most likely to succeed if yous make the contend significantly college. If you heighten it past six-inch increments, you are simply training him to bound or climb higher and higher a small step at a time. Heighten your four-foot contend to six feet in one fell swoop (assuming your local ordinances allow a half-dozen-human foot fence) for the best shot at stopping your escape artist in his tracks. (Note: Besides make sure there are no handy "launching pads" nearly the contend – a canis familiaris business firm, a firewood box, your child's trampoline; even a tree can give your canis familiaris a head commencement over your debate.)

Some American Ninja Warrior dogs find it a uncomplicated matter to scale or sail over nigh any fence, regardless of height. Yous can install the canine equivalent of the "warped wall" by calculation an extension to your argue that angles inward at the superlative. This makes information technology much harder for your dog to judge the fence peak, and ensures he can't grab the top and pull himself over. The longer the inward extension, the harder information technology is for your domestic dog to navigate a jump or climb.

If you know he is climbing rather than sailing over, consider the "Coyote Roller," either the commercially available product or a do-information technology-yourself projection, suspending PVC pipe on a wire at the elevation of your fence. Originally designed to go on coyotes out, information technology can be just as constructive at keeping your domestic dog in your yard. When he scales the fence and tries to catch the top to pull himself over, the pipage rolls, he can't go a grip, and he drops dorsum within his yard. Another tactic that works for some for jumpers (but not all) is to found shrubbery inside the contend line at his take-off point, and so his flying path is interrupted. Of course, bushes take fourth dimension to grow, so this would be a longer-term solution.

Dogs Who Dig Under Fences

Some dogs are masters at burrowing under fences. While no detail blazon of dog has a patent on digging, terriers and olfactory property hounds do logically seem to excel in this beliefs, given what they were bred to do. A quick gear up for the groundhog dog might be to set heavy cement blocks (every bit in "and so heavy yous can barely lift them") all along the within perimeter of the debate. This might cease some of the more than fainthearted diggers, just chances are information technology may only stall your dedicated excavation dog while you plan and implement the more work-intensive project of burying wire 12 inches deep forth the bottom of your debate, setting the cement block into the pigsty and covering information technology with dirt.

If you're but putting upwards a new fence, exist sure to bury it six to 12 inches into the ground to save later headache. If you want to go the landscaping route, effort planting something with thorns along the inside of the contend.

Dogs Who Run Around Barriers

Beware the door dashers and gate crashers! Gate crashers are close kin to door darters, merely perform their escape maneuvers from inside the yard rather than the house, charging through the gate as presently every bit it is opened a crack by some unwary man. There doesn't seem to be any particular blazon of dog that favors this behavior; whatsoever sufficiently motivated dog tin acquire the dash-and-run routine.

Information technology's not e'er the dog who is at fault; those most oft guilty of aiding and abetting gate crashers include children, meter readers, visitors to your home, and other adults who aren't fully committed to keeping your dog in his yard.

The best way to foil a gate crasher is to install a double-gate system like those used at many dog parks. This handily keeps the dog away from the gate to the outer world while the human enters the yard, secures the first gate behind herself, and then opens the gate into the dog's inner yard. Other than that, your all-time option is to padlock all your gates and only enter the k through the house.

Of course, y'all can teach your dog a solid "Expect" cue, and apply information technology every fourth dimension a gate is opened. But then yous are relying on children, meter readers, visitors and not-committed adults to remember to use the "Look" cue when they become in and out the gates. So, even meliorate, teach your dog that the opening gate is the cue to "Wait" until he is invited out. While you're working on that, though, better install those padlocks!

Dogs Who Become Through Fences

Then there are those dogs who just blast their way through a fence. Large, strong dogs (Rotties, Pitties, etc.) accept the best shot at this escape technique, although if the fence is weak enough, smaller dogs can exercise information technology, too. Most fences seem to have boards nailed on the exterior – probably for artful reasons – so if nails are loose or boards are starting to rot effectually nail holes, a skilful shove from the inside can push button them off.

To foil these escapees, either repair your fence and then boards are solidly nailed on, or boom a solid barrier on the within of the fence. If y'all are putting up a new fence, endeavor nailing boards on the inside instead of the outside, or installing pre-congenital panels so boards are on the within. Thorny landscaping might also aid you hither, but, once again, plants take time to grow.

A Stay-Calm Kai

Last yr we adopted a yr-old Australian Kelpie we named Kai. We knew our 4-foot, somewhat dilapidated contend might not exist acceptable to contain this energetic, athletic dog. Fingers crossed, we permit him into the backyard with our older dogs.

All was well for several days. Then, one morning as I was feeding chickens in the lower barn, I heard a ka-thump from the lawn. Next affair I knew Kai had joined me at the craven coop. Clearly, he had establish a mode out. I prayed that he had gone through, not over. Tightening up our boards would exist a much easier (and cheaper) set up than raising the fence or installing a new one.

I reported the news to my married man, Paul, also known as our farm handyman. Upon inspecting the contend, he constitute the loose board, and spent the afternoon re-placing and re-fastening any boards that were the least bit suspect. Kai hasn't escaped since. Phew!

May your own escapee fixes exist equally simple – or at least as successful!

Book author and trainer Pat Miller, CBCC-KA, CPDT-KA, is WDJ's Training Editor. She and her married man Paul live in Fairplay, Maryland, site of her Peaceable Paws training middle.