Carl & the Fence

When we brought Carl the Cattle Dog home last autumn we thought we'd hit the jackpot. Many dogs are antisocial or just plain thick, but Carl proved to be a dog of talent and personality. He learned new tricks and took to house training so quickly that I made a note to keep the computer and credit card out of his reach at all times. And as soon as he met the neighbour's dogs he instantly made friends and wagged his tail so happily at every furry resident, even the ones who patently didn't like him, that we saw smooth sailing with him.

Unfortunately, Carl turned out to be so social that he felt obliged to pop 'round to every dog within barking distance and he was so smart that he figured out the concept of plausible deniablity and would be conveniently hard of hearing when called home. So we decided that some means had to be found to confine Carl to the grounds of Chez Szondy.

The method we finally settled on was the invisible fence. For those of you who have never seen one ("Seen one!" Invisible fence!' Arf! Arf! Arf! Sorry.) this is a clever little contraption that involves a radio transmitter hooked to a wire buried around the perimeter of wherever you want to keep Fido inside or out of. The dog wears a special collar around his neck with a radio receiver and two blunt prongs resting against the skin. If the dog gets too close to the wire, the collar picks up the signal and starts beeping. If the dog keeps going, he gets a nasty, but harmless electric shock.

The principle is fairly simple and the manual, filled with all sorts of helpful illustrations, made the wire sound a snap to install, which it is-- if you're in your early twenties, built like a navvy, and have a battery of the requisite excavating tools. On the other hand, if you're a middle-aged writer armed with a lawn edger and a garden trowel, the task is a trifle more arduous. Fortunately, Chez Szondy is surrounded on two sides by flower beds and on the other two by woods, so I counted myself lucky that I only had to cut up about twenty feet of sod instead of a thousand, but I have yet to decide if I have more of a dislike for digging hundreds of feet of trench or stringing wire through bramble bushes and stinging nettles.

Having buried the wire, strung it through a culvert under the drive and twisted thirty feet of strand so that it could reach the transmitter without sending a signal along the connecting length, I switched on the fence and tested it by the unconventional method of forgetting that I had the receiver collar in my other hand. I made a note to be very sympathetic to Carl when he got too close himself.

Next came training, which the manual made seem a simple matter of pleasant master/dog quality time and a bit of patience. As per the manual, I walked along the wire with the collar,listened for the beeping, and laid out flags along the edge of the "safe" zone. Think of Steve McQueen trying to figure out the blind spots between the gurad towers and you get the idea. So far, so good. I then put Carl on his lead and walked him along the flags with a brief yank every time he strayed too close.

This went on for three days and Carl seemed to be getting the idea without any trouble. I was feeling pretty smug at Carl's progress. It looked as though the manual was right after all.

On the fourth day, it was time to put the receiver collar on Carl and let him test the system for himself. The idea was that Carl should get close enough to hear the beeping and then I'd run with him to the centre of the yard where I would lavish praise on him. Do this a few times, finish up with twenty minutes of happy play, and repeat over the next couple of days.

That was the manual talking. In reality, Carl went up to the flags, beeped, took another step, got a shock, and bolted into the house and under the bed.

He stayed there until the next morning.

I tried again that evening.

Carl hid under the bed for two days.

My wife was convinced that we'd broken the dog.

I was beginning to think that we were resigned to Carl as a black shadow that flits from hidey hole to hidey hole as his food disappears. We treated Carl like a recovering argophobic; coaxing him out the door and then further and further away from the house with treats and toys until he'll now go a good twenty feet from the building. Twice, under the theory that we were causing the beeps with mind control, Carl tried running the fence while we weren't looking.

Under the bed he went.

Still, he is starting to make peace with the fence. He's learning that it's rather nice being able to go outside whenever he wants to for as long as he likes, that he can accompany me around the garden while I do my chores, that it's good fun to sit out in the sun with the family on a Saturday afternoon, and there is the wonderful new sport of digging up the flower beds.

It's not all beer and skittles, of course. He whines pitifully when he sees one of his friends who won't or can't come over and play, the squirrels can now elude him (as if they couldn't before!) and the neighbour's cat has figured things out and torments Carl accordingly. But, Carl no longer dives under the bed in terror.

Unless he sees a bug.