What is "Proper Containment" & Why Should I Bother? Proper Containment is just a place for your dog to be on your private property safely, and not loose on Public Property or on anyone else's private property. In most areas of the Country, the Law of the Land expressly states that there is an applicable Leash Law in effect. Most of these laws read as follows: Permitting animals to run at large is unlawful. Animals must be kept under restraint by leash, confined to premises, or under the effective control of the owner. Dogs are not permitted to run unleashed on public streets, sidewalks, other public places or other people's property. It is the Responsibility of the Dog Owner to be appraised of the applicable leash law in your area. Unless you have time to walk your dog frequently each day, you will need to provide a safe, secure area in which your dog can exercise and relieve itself. With some canines, the need for proper containment is a necessity, not a convenience. Some dogs are Born to Run, and some are Houdini's protégé. Keeping them contained is a challenge, and a challenge that you must face successfully, or face the risk of losing your companion. Their natural curiosity and inherent intelligence can make containment one of the first steps toward responsible ownership. There are as many methods of securing proper containment as there are Imaginations to produce them. Have fun with it! Create an outdoor space for your companion that is stimulating and fun to be in. Create a Play Yard! It doesn't have to be a place of sadness or isolation; good containments are often places your companion will genuinely enjoy spending time in! If you do have a Canine Houdini, consider this list of standard equipment in building your containment: 1) Dig Guards 2) Tilt-ins/Tip-ins, or height of fence. 3) Type of fencing materials. 4) Other supplementary systems, such as Hot Wire. One of the major tricks of successful containment is building it strong so that they never learn they can escape the first time. A Hint: If it looks like they MIGHT escape, they probably will. Don't wait till after they escape to address the problem, some breeds will test & test a new containment, and often, if they discover a way out once, won't quit until they do it again. If you build your containment so as to counteract every point of test BEFORE the test occurs, your chances of safely containing your companion are maximized. 1) Dig Guards: Many dogs like to dig. Some are driven to it! Some are such good excavators as to be considered bulldozers in their own right. For these animals, dig guards can be a major stress saver. A Dig Guard can be made of poured concrete, rock, or wire. A Dig Guard should be approx. 4 ft. wide. Imagine the capital letter "L". The foot of the "L" is your dig guard. A poured slab of concrete is a very effective dig guard. If you choose to use rocks, be sure they are large enough to not be able to be excavated, as some dogs are extremely strong. I have seen a Husky/Shepherd mix move a 3 ft diameter stone with little trouble. I couldn't move the darned thing, but she did...A good idea would be to dig a trench of approx 2 ft in depth to lay the rock slabs in, and then cover with fill dirt. I, personally, use wire. You can use chain link, or anything stiffer, but you must be careful to use strong ply wire. Chicken wire or garden wire will not work. It is too flimsy, and they will just pull it up, or in some cases tear it up. I prepared my dig guards by raking back five feet from the fence line back into the containment, laying 4-ft tall chainlink lengths down, and hog ringing them to the actual fence fabric (not the bottom runner wire) every one foot. [Note: "Hog Rings" are small metal rings that you squeeze around one piece of wire to connect with another piece of wire, and clamp shut.] I found chainlink easier to manage than the stiffer panels, and I had less waste, as with chainlink, you can weave the pieces together to work around the slope of the ground, tree trunks, or other ground obstacles. I found that was a lot more difficult where I used stiff wire panels. After it was all hog-ringed, I pulled all the dirt back over the chainlink to cover it, and then scattered a layer of bedding straw over that. Small pea-gravel can also be used as a covering over the wire. I found that they don't care to walk on the chainlink, and I didn't want to subtract any square footage from their Yard. 2) Tilt-ins/Tips-ins and height of fencing: Have you seen some of these guys jump? It is a thing of beauty! It is also a thing of incredible frustration, as you watch your companion blithely sail over the fence. That same Husky/Shepherd mix mentioned above, the rock mover? I watched her clear a full six-foot wooden fence, perch on the edge of the fence, and hop on over to the other side. The neighbor's side, of course. The reason I use Tilt-ins, is purely psychological. A two-foot tilt-in looms over your head, and makes the fence look imposing and inescapable. They use this kind of psychological containment in some zoos. Even if the animal could, in actuality, clear the fence, using a tilt-in makes it look as if they cannot. Also, if they DO test it by climbing, they have that last 2 feet of inward sloping fencing to scale. It's not easy! 3) Type of Fencing Materials: The type of fencing material you use can make all the difference. Your choice of fencing material basically depends on the breed & temperament of dog you have. If you have a chewer, you might not want to use wooden fencing, as some dogs can chew through wood. If you have a climber, a block wall construction or any fencing with easy toe-holds might be problematical for you. If you use wooden posts in your construction, make sure to protect the below ground wood with a protection coating against termites, wood rot, or moisture, as this can greatly increase the life of your fencing. Make sure that the treatment you use for your posts and wood is safe from gnawing canines, in the event of experimental chewing. I chose chainlink for my fencing for a couple of reasons. It is a lot easier to connect the dig guards to a chainlink fence, chainlink is easy to weave and easy to install, and, we can see through it, so they don't feel too isolated, and I can see what the rascals might be up to! A Tip: Check your local paper & the local dump for used fencing material, some fencing materials are easily salvaged with a bit of elbow grease, and can save you a lot of money! 4) Fencing supplements: I use HotWire. I am a firm proponent of HotWire, because it has alleviated many of the problems of testing. I use 12-inch insulators, and run one strand one foot off the ground, and one strand just below the tilt-in. The ground wire has prevented any attempts at serious dislodging of the dig guards, and the top wire has prevented all attempts at climbing. I leave my HotWire on all the time, unless I'm in there with them, just for the added protection. However, make sure you check the applicable laws in your area, as in some areas it is illegal to use HotWire. For information on USDA rated facility standards, here are several links to peruse. http://www.usda.gov/ -USDA Home Page http://www.aphis.usda.gov/ -APHIS Home Page http://warp.nal.usda.gov/awic/legislat/usdaleg1.htm -Animal Welfare Act & Regulations http://www.aphis.usda.gov/lpa/press/1999/10/awafence.txt -USDA Fencing Amendment Proper Containment also includes a sheltered area that they cannot use as a launching pad in order to clear the fence. A shelter provides a place away from rain, extreme cold, or direct sun. Here again, your Imagination is your only limit. Two of my best shelters are built out of recycled materials. One is a hollow dug out of the ground with a log cabin built in a circle around the pit. The logs are set upright, with a pitched roof atop. The second is an old queen-sized four-poster hardwood bed frame, turned upside down, and roofed at a slant. One of the most original shelters I've seen was made all of bales of straw. Make sure your roofs and beams are sturdy, because the roof will be a favorite hang-out! Finally, with some of that left-over Imagination you have laying around, you can create a stimulating outdoor atmosphere for your companion. Build a few ramps that lead to sturdy platforms, allowing for King of the Platform games. Make a jungle gym! Remember to keep elevated areas away from the edges of the containment, they may use them as launching pads. How about an old piece of large corrugated drainage pipe? Make sure the edges are not sharp, as you don't want anyone to get hurt. And for the diggers out there? Build a sandbox! Encourage them to dig in their sandbox by burying "treasure" such as old bones, and toys. Before I close, I feel it is important to discuss what is NOT Proper Primary Containment. Chaining or aerial cables should never be used as a Primary source of containment. There are some exceptions, of course, such as sled-dogs; however, their circumstances are considerably different from those of a companion animal. In my personal experience, I suggest aerial cables only as an Emergency or short-term containment. I use them when we go camping, with hyper-vigilant supervision. The main reason I am so adamantly against chaining as a primary source of containment is Safety. Both safety for the animal, and safety for the Public. The tales I have heard from grieving parents are terrible. One woman lost her malamute during a freak lightening storm. A bolt seared through an overhead branch, which crashed down and impaled her dog, causing fatal internal injuries. In another case, a dog got his leg tangled up in an aerial cable line. His parents were not available to untangle him, and he continued twisting and writhing attempting to extricate himself. When they finally discovered his plight, the aerial cable had wrapped itself around his leg so tightly, it cut off all circulation to that leg, and they had to have it amputated. The number of times I've heard of an animal hanging itself are countless. In fact, my husband accidentally caused the death of one of our puppies. I was at work, he put her on a chain for "just a minute" while he went to the store. He was gone no more than 15 minutes. When he returned, he found her dead. She had gotten frightened and distressed, and jumped the short fence. It was just short enough so she could not reach the ground, and could not find her feet to jump back over. She hung herself. The convenience of chaining is not worth the risk of disfigurement or death. I would never want to hear anyone suffering the grief and guilt that I and my husband went through, especially since it is all so avoidable. So, I beg of you.. If you love your companion, do not use a chain or an aerial cable as a primary source of containment. The other part of safety which chaining can affect is the Public Safety. Dogs have a marked Fight or Flight reflex. A chain severely limits their personal space. Dogs have a "Comfort Zone" just like Humans do. A chain squeezes that "Comfort Zone" smaller. Chained dogs tend to be more territorial than dogs in Yards. Territoriality can lead to demonstrations of aggressive behavior, even for a non-aggressive dog. They feel their territory is being violated, they try to run & hide, find they cannot, and then turn and fight. On the whole, I believe the statistics show that chained dogs are more prone to biting attacks than are non-chained dogs. For an Adobe Acrobat copy of a very interesting case study, see below. Gershman KA, Sacks JJ, Wright JC. Which dogs bite? A case-control study of risk factors. Pediatrics 1994;93:913-7. Biting and non-biting dogs in Denver are compared. Biting dogs were more likely to be male, unneutered, and chained. As you can see, proper containment can be a big responsibility. You need to evaluate the type of dog you have, and what its needs are, your financial situation and availability of materials, and the applicable laws in your area. A Containment doesn't have to be a prison, it can be a fun, safe place for your companion to enjoy.   This article was written by K. Mills (member) and donated to the National Wolfdog Alliance. Copyright © 2001 K.Mills and NWA, Inc.   For more information, please e-mail education@wolfdogalliance.org.         Go back to NWA Education: Containment Requirements for site navigation.