The Dog Who Beat the Radio Fence

The Dog Who Beat the Radio Fence

When Valkrys was almost two years old and feeling spunky, she would hop the fence and peruse the neighborhood. She was pretty friendly to one and all, but not too far away was a four lane thoroughfare as well as an interstate highway. Being a responsible owner, I wanted to prevent her #1 getting hit by a car, and #2 scaring anyone who didn’t know her, after all, she was a big girl weighing in at 55 pounds.

Back then, the newest and greatest thing since bagged kibble was the radio fence. One weekend, I spent many long hours digging a trench around our house and laying down wire for the radio fence, inserting dozens of little white flags, wiring in the power supply, and fussing about actually having a collar shock my dog. I was not too keen on the idea, but neither was I fond of putting her on a chain. The next several days were spent teaching Valkrys about the little white flags, the beeping sound, and the need not to ignore the beeping sound. Valkrys learned all this very quickly, and was happily perusing the yard within three days, patently avoiding the beeping sounds when I was watching her.

The next test was to let her out for an hour on her own to see if she would attempt to cross the fence. She didn’t try it, but unfortunately I didn’t have many more days left to simply test her ability to stay within the boundary. With high hopes, I left for work with her happily playing with Thor (our other dog) in the back yard.

My hopes were dashed, though, when she greeted me in the driveway when I came home. My husband didn’t know how long she had been out of the back yard (it was not attached to his computer). I checked the batteries in the collar, and sure enough, they were dead. I went to the store and picked up a brand new set of batteries and installed them. Fairly confident, I headed off to work the next day, expecting to see Valkrys in the back yard when I came home.

Not so! Again she greeted me on the driveway, and mysteriously, the batteries in her collar were again dead! Now I know I have a tendency to drain the odd watch battery, but I had never heard of such a thing from a dog. But, radio fences and shock collars were quite new to the dog training world. I was still rather suspicious of the notion, though, so asked my husband to watch her carefully the next day when he put her out.

This is what he saw. Valkrys had learned very well about the warning beep. So well in fact that she sat exactly five feet away from the buried wire until the collar stopped beeping. She would then, very casually stroll across the buried wire and jump the fence.

Valkrys beat the radio fence hands down.