If you are looking for an invisible solution to keep your dog from running into the street, you have a few choices of technology. All three of the technologies will likely save you money versus a physical fence and will save you on maintenance and the labor of weed eating around it. As with anything, there are pros and cons and a variety of opinions of each. As the owner of Derby’s Pet Fence, I have become intimately familiar with each type and have used them all. Below is a high-level summary of each type of technology.
Wired
This is the first technology introduced that allowed the safe containment of a dog without the use of a physical barrier. It is sometimes called an underground fence because the wire gets buried. It was introduced many years ago by the company called The Invisible Fence Company. This company has since been purchased by Radio Systems Corporation. The technology puts an electromagnetic field on a wire that gets buried around the property. Your dog will wear a receiver collar that will activate when it gets close to the wire. With minimal training, your dog will stay safely in your yard. Your dog will respect the boundary and usually only needs 3 to 7 corrections to understand and will likely go several years before ever getting another correction because he will remember the boundaries.
These systems are very flexible in the size and shape of the area to be contained. There are wired systems that can go up to 100 acres, and all systems can do very small properties. The collars are very reliable and will stay charged for weeks at a time. If your system requires the battery to be replaced, the battery will usually last for 3 or 4 months before replacement is necessary.
Wireless
Wireless technology was introduced next. With this technology, the dog’s receiver/collar activates when it leaves the electromagnetic field. When the dog leaves the field, the collar activates with a warning and a correction. The training is the same as with the wired system.
Because there is no wire to carry the electromagnetic field, this represents the fundamental difference. There is no wire to bury or to get broken when digging occurs. This also means the system can easily be taken with you to other properties or on vacation. Just keep in mind to always teach the dogs with flags at each location until he learns the new boundary. The collars for these systems are often rechargeable and will hold a charge for several days.
The downside to wireless technology is that the containment area must be a circle. This is severely restrictive since I have yet to meet anyone with a round yard. The transmitter must be in the center of the circle. he transmitter is about twice the size of a soccer ball. This may end up being in the middle of your dining room or some other location that is not desirable. The size of the circle is adjustable but still limited to a relatively small area (I believe 90’ is the maximum). This forces the dog owner to limit the space for the dog to enjoy. In small yards, it’s sometimes impossible to avoid the containment circle from going into the neighbor’s property.
An even bigger issue with this technology is that since the collar only activates when the dog leaves the electromagnetic field, that means that the dog (and you and your family) are constantly inside of an electromagnetic field. The magnetic field is the strongest near the transmitter (which is in your house) and gets weaker the farther you get from the transmitter. I am not educated enough to say if bathing in an electromagnetic field 24/7 is harmful, but I had an engineer from the industry tell me “Let’s put it this way, I wouldn’t put the transmitter in my baby’s room”.
GPS
The newest technology to hit the market for invisible dog containment is GPS. There are definitely a few advantages to GPS. First, it can do almost an unlimited-size property. It also does not require burying a wire, so they are often a bit cheaper than wired systems. And, it can easily be moved to a new location (again – still requiring the flags and training at each location).
However, the negatives of this technology are substantial. I purchased a Halo GPS system a few years ago. I wanted to get familiar with the new technology so I would be able to answer questions about it. I also was worried that it would be superior to the wired systems and that I may have to change my business model. I no longer see that as an issue after my experience.
First, it was extremely difficult for me to set up. But, I am a baby boomer and perhaps not patient enough. After I gave up, I turned the chore over to a much younger employee who loves playing with technology. Even he got frustrated, but eventually got it set up and working. We tested the system and found some MAJOR flaws. In addition to the difficult setup, the collar does not activate consistently at the same location at the boundary. We noticed it would activate 4 to 8’ differently from one time to another. That’s a lot of variability and can confuse or stress a dog. As with all training, consistency is very important.
The collar was rechargeable. This is normally a good thing because it saves on expensive battery replacements. However, the collar could only hold a charge for 8 to 12 hours. This makes the collar fairly high maintenance, and it totally defeats one of the system’s features. The system I bought said you could use the GPS technology in the event your dog ever runs away. But, if your dog runs away in the evening – you will have limited time to locate your dog before the collar stops sending a signal. So, about the time when panic is setting in, you will be out of luck and won’t have the benefit of the GPS location.
The collar was also very large compared to the collars associated with the other technologies. I don’t think it would be suitable for any dog from about the size of a beagle down.
But the worst flaw of this technology (at least with the Halo collar) is that the collar goes into “sleep” mode when the dog isn’t moving for a while. I imagine this is to try to preserve what little battery life it has. It took several seconds to “wake up” after it detected movement. My employee and I did a simulation of what would happen if your dog was napping on the front porch and then woke up to find his favorite canine friend walking across the street. I had my employee sprint as fast as he could from a resting position on my front porch. By the time the collar “woke up” and delivered a warning signal, my employee was 100 feet PAST the boundary. More than enough on most properties that the dog would have been on the other side of the street!
If you are in Louisville, Lexington, Southern Indiana, or any of the surrounding areas, Stephen Baralt is the owner of Derby’s Pet Fence and will be happy to help you with your electronic pet fencing. We are a local and independent company. We have a real live person answer our phone 7 days a week! We give free quotes right over the phone. In addition to installation of new fences, we are happy to service and repair any brand of fencing, regardless of who installed it. Call or text us at 502-314-7398 / 859-327-7760, or visit our site at www.DerbysFence.com. Prefer email? Steve@derbysfence.com