Invisible fencing; another take

It largely depends on the dog.  I use the fencing to keep my
fence-climbing Labrador inside a 4' chain link fence that otherwise he
clears in a leap.  He will remember about the fencing for about a week
and then when the batteries go dead or the wire gets cut (mine's not
buried), he's out again.

I used the fence alone for a while, but it wasn't successful on either
of the dogs I owned then.  The Maltese wouldn't leave the front porch,
and the Old English would bolt right through the fence despite the
warning and the shock when he was running from thunder.  Then he'd get
stuck outside the fence when the storm passed because he wasn't afraid
anymore.

I have tested the collars on myself--they aren't fun, but they're not
debilitating.  You can set both the strength of the field and the length
of prong on the collar to adjust the range of warning.  For some dogs,
you can turn the whole thing off after a month or two and the dog will
never stray.  (But that's terrifically dog- and temptation- dependent.)

If the garden beds are complicated, it's going to be hard to use the
fence and still have "free" room in the garden.  I have pretty much
given over most of the backyard to the dogs, and the front yard is for
the plants, but I'm much less of a gardener now with three dogs than I
used to be with one or none.

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