Any recommendations for a wireless invisible fence - I’ve researched some but would like some real life recommendations…and criticisms.
I’m not a fan of invisible fences. They don’t keep threats (stray dogs, wild animals, people who mean harm) out of your yard. Many dogs learn to run quickly through and just brace themselves for the shock, because the freedom is worth it to them… but once they’re out, they can’t get back in.
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Have you got personal experiences of failed fences? I’ve heard the above, too, but there are an awful lot of
manufacturers out there with good reviews and my dog will not run through the electric fence around our
property, but with construction going on, the driveway is open for crews, deliveries and trucks (hard to explain).
Was hoping for a personal recommendation.
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I have the Invisible Fence brand for my dogs and it works wonderfully. I was very skeptical at first, but with proper training we have had no issues. The training method I understood was that the dogs don’t think “I can’t go over there because I will get shocked”, it is “I can’t go over there because it is off limits to me”. I have a GSD X and a very stubborn chesapeake bay retriever. Also, with this brand they do not get a shock on the way back into the fence. If they were to exit the area, they can safety return without being punished with a shock.
I remove the collars at night and when I am at work and dogs are in the house.
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We have the Invisible Fence brand and it has worked great. Have trained a lab and several JRTs to it. Even my one year old JRT will go chase the deer that come in the yard and stop when she nears the fence line. Took some time to do the correct training, but was well worth it. We got it originally as my mom’s JRT really had a death wish and as a pup would run out to the road, under horses, etc. So we have a 1 acre area surrounding the house, so there’s lot of running room. My old JRT, would once and a while run through…but only if you had the truck and horse trailer hooked up and running…she would run through and jump up into her truck. I ended up leaving her collar off…as she wouldn’t wander far from me or the house/barn anyway. And that way she didn’t have to go through the fence. All my other dogs it works great for…and nice to be able to let them run and not worry. Even my JRT, who is a year, goes across the fence with me to the barn (no fence collar on, and on leash)…and she knows the leash and command word to mean she’s allowed across that fence edge. But put the collar on, and she won’t cross, even if I am there. It just takes the time to do the training properly.
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Is that the one with the wire dug into the ground or wireless?
Yes, the Invisible Fence is fantastic and works very well. I’ve moved a few times since I had mine first installed and I simply bought new wire and kept them above ground instead of burying them.
My parents had a beagle mix when I was younger who didn’t think twice about powering through their electric fence if she saw a bunny - after she escaped a few times they had to implement a policy of not letting her out if she wasn’t actively supervised (which was the reason they got the fence to begin with).
A coworker of mine also recently had her small dog attacked on a walk when a German Shepherd belonging to a neighbor blew through his invisible fence to get to her, which was totally traumatic for everyone.
For the right dog I could see an invisible fence being okay. If your dog doesn’t have a high prey drive and isn’t dog aggressive, isn’t small enough to be a guaranteed loser in a fight with another dog, and if you don’t live in a residential neighborhood, invisible fencing can be a good option. Even with the “right dog,” I’d still be very hesitant to leave a dog home alone with access to a yard contained only by an invisible fence.
I know physical fences can be horribly expensive, though… my SO and I considered an invisible fence for our two acre yard but ultimately decided to just save the money for a physical fence. The risks for escape or other problems were too great with the invisible fence, from our perspective. I don’t doubt my larger dog would blow through it in pursuit of a delicious looking deer.
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My neighbor has one and while I don’t know the type or brand, I do know that it’s sales every single time it rains. Her labs get out and she has paid several fines to animal control
My friend used one with great success - I think it was PetSafe - https://www.petsafe.net/support/wireless-fences/wireless-containment-system
Obviously the wireless ones depend a lot on the shape of your property. She had five acres set back from the road so she was able to create a clear area that was safe. If you live in a residential area it might not work very well because your containment area may go into sidewalks, streets, etc.
She did say that her dogs knew when the batteries were dead - no question. But when the batteries were charged, they never challenged it. She had a lab and lab mix in a rural setting.
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I used invisible fence to keep the dog OFF the 4’ residential fence and it really worked beautifully for that. She loved to jump and see the people walking on the path on the other side.
I can see it working well without a backup physical fence for a soft dog with plenty of time invested in fence training. High drive? No way.
We’ve found a few implementations of it here on this property from the previous owners, along with a chain bolted to a tree in the backyard. Don’t think it worked for them at all by all accounts, but they were also unlikely to put in the training required.
My dog jumped over a 6 foot fence multiple times so a physical fence really isn’t an option for us. We don’t have an electric fence as he’s pretty good about not going anywhere and wears an e-collar when outside for extended periods of time (with us). An electric fence is on the list of things to get though. My mom had one for our golden and it worked great for him.
We have the wire that is buried in the ground…which can be pricey to fix when you plant some shrubs and forget where the wire goes…and cut through it with the shovel. Oops!
I would never leave ours out without being home…but it’s nice to be out working in the yard and not have to leash them. If no one is home, they are inside. Also, we are in a wooded/farm area, so no close neighbors…and we have enough room that they are pretty far from the road (so no temptation with chasing joggers/cars…and no nearby dogs to come into the yard…unless one strayed pretty far from home/got lost). So you have to look at your individual situation and dog’s personality and decide.
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I think she would respect it - our whole place has 3-board fencing with an electric horse fence at about 1’ off the ground
and she’s never gone through that. But with construction there is now a driveway for crew and deliveries so it is hard to fence it in properly. Boxers have almost no neck hair and she’s pretty sensitive . Right now her life is pretty restrictive being on a tie-out when she goes out and I feel sorry for a formerly free dog.
I’ve been using the same Petsafe system for nearly 15 years with no problems. It’s supposed to be buried, but we just zip tied the wire along the existing livestock fence (4 acres total enclosed). It’s only buried (actually it runs through a buried PVC pipe) at the driveway and gate, and along one 50 yard section where there’s no fence. I have hunting dogs and lots of varmints around, but since the shock zone is adjusted to be quite wide, they don’t blow through it. We use the stubborn dog collar; the dinky little collars that came with the system didn’t hold up, and didn’t have enough juice for the bigger dogs.
Where people get into trouble with these is:
-Collar too loose (when nose is to ground, the collar hangs down and prongs lose contact with the neck)
-Letting dogs out when system is off, or failing to replace collar batteries when warning light is flashing
-Smaller subdivision sized yard with no fence/barrier at all (THIS is where they will blow through the shock zone, because the shock zone is so small that a running dog will clear it in a fraction of a second)
-Issues with strays/predators entering the property
For people like me who have several acres or more enclosed in a livestock fence, it’s ideal. The e-collar prevents the dog from climbing over, digging under, or pushing through the livestock fence, and the livestock fence blocks the dog from blowing through the shock zone. It’s also very economical - a few hundred dollars, as opposed to thousands in material and labor to install several acres of dog proof fence.
With all that said, I don’t leave dogs loose when no one’s home, until they are older and very reliable. Good luck!
I too have an Invisible Fence. Have had on on 3 different properties and have trained about 8 dogs to it aging from 3 months to 10yrs old at time of training. Some people absolutely hate them. I’ve had zero issues. All of mine were professionally installed by the company. The bottom line is if you do not take the time to train a dog correctly to it you have wasted your money and set your dog up for failure.
Thanks you everyone. Esp the idea of laying the line under the driveway through a plastic pipe.
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My neighbor had the PetSafe system on 7 acres. Four board fencing, pipe under driveway. They just stapled the wired to the bottom fence board. It worked great for labs, a Great Dane. Pit mix and a Bernese Mountain dog.
I’ve used two different types of invisible fences with somewhat mixed results.
First, let me state that my dogs respected the fences, without condition. I had a crazy catahoula, a border collie mix, an aussie/golden mix, and great dane mix. Some of those were both exceptionally intelligent and exceptionally stubborn. All were contained by the fence. That said … the catahoula was an absolute expert at figuring out when the batteries on her collar were dead and escaping then. This was before the collars had the light on them that gave you heads-up that the battery needed to be replaced. I think she tested it daily (it beeps before it shocks) and knew instantly when the battery was dead (due to lack of beeping). Once I bought the collar that signaled when the battery was dead, I stopped having issues with either.
Some notes: I used three different set ups over the years. First was a wireless fence that reinforced a physical fence in a property that was relatively flat/new construction; second was the same wireless fence without a physical fence on a house that was both hilly and older (built in the 1950s); third was an underground fence on property #2 without a physical fence.
My original set up was a wireless fence that reinforced a short (4 ft) physical fence. (I had tried a wired fence but my ground was too hard for it to work/bury well so I moved on to the wireless variety) One of my dogs was able to jump the physical fence (largely thanks to agility lessons but she might have figured it out on her own) and another was thin enough she could get through the slats. This fence combo contained all three dogs as long as the batteries were active. Two of my dogs (catahoula and border collie mix) would figure it out and escape when the collar batteries were dead. This was largely mitigated when they came out with the collars that indicated when the batteries were dying. The golden/aussie mix never tested the fence. Neither did the great dane mix when she came along, though she is neither thin enough to fit through the slats nor agile enough to jump the fence.
A few years ago, after many (10+) years of using the wireless fence, I moved back to my hometown. I lived with my parents for several months until I was able to buy a house. We originally tried to use my wireless fence to contain the dogs but had several issues.
My original thought was that since the dogs were all familiar with the wireless fence concept, we wouldn’t have any trouble transitioning from using it at my old home to using it at my parents’ home. The thought was that they already knew the boundary flags, they already were familiar with the “beep” equals “shock in a few steps” concept. This turned out to be correct in thought but incorrect in execution.
My parents’ house is on property that was somewhat hilly, and was a solid brick house. I was never able to find a place to put the wireless fence that it worked as desired/designed. It worked, but had a tendency to shock my dogs when they weren’t trying to escape. They wouldn’t leave the porch … and sometimes they even got shocked when on the porch. It was awful. Since my agreement with my parents was that we could stay with them as long as the dogs were outside during the day, this was absolutely awful.
To backtrack a bit, the radio fences (wireless fences) work by sending an inhibition signal. So, as long as the signal is being sent, the dog does not get shocked. However, if something interrupts the signal, such as the dog moving out of the boundary, the shock is allowed to go through. In this situation, I was having trouble with keeping the “shock” signal inhibited. Not because my dogs were moving out of the boundary, but because the signal was having a hard time getting through my parents’ house.
Obviously, this was not OK.
My dad and I ended up getting a wired fence and installing it ourselves. I’m pretty sure we used PetSafe. This worked exactly as designed. No issues other than the pain of installing it. Dogs contained … even the bull-headed catahoula didn’t chase the deer that came on property. (I have a classic picture of her standing on the exact edge of the boundary barking at the deer). Mailmen/UPS men were able to deliver packages without issue (when they were brave enough to walk past the barking dogs). In the 6+ months we lived there, they never breached the boundary.
Now I’m in a very small house with a very very very small yard and I’m using neither. I have a questionable physical fence, but so far it is containing my three (the great dane mix from the first house, a true mutt that has german sheppard, staffordshire terrier, and boxer as his top three breeds, and a coonhound mix). I don’t think the wireless fence would work in this house even if I needed it (house is very very old and SOLID … I never hear my neighbors even though we share a wall. I have zero confidence that the radio fence inhibition signal would get out). If I have to I will absolutely go back to the underground fence to augment the crappy physical fence but thus far the dogs are happy to pee in my back yard and come back inside.
In the meantime if anyone wants to try out the wireless (radio) fence version that I have, just PM me. It is free if you can pick it up, otherwise you can have it for the cost of shipping it to you (my zip code is 15203). I used it for 10+ years, I won’t lose anything by giving it away. I probably have a few collars and some batteries I can dig up for you as well.(did I mention that I have a really really small house now and want to get rid of as much crap as I can?) I only recommend it if you have a relatively flat yard and have a house that the radio waves will not be interfered with, but if you are able to meet those conditions it should work well for you, especially if you are using it to augment a physical fence. If you try it and it doesn’t work for you you are free to give it away to the next person. Once I give it to you it is yours to do with as you please. I am sure that there are newer versions of this device that work better, but again mine is free for the cost of shipping.
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thanks friends. a lot of new and useful information.
