Anyone had experience of this, we have reserved a 4 and a half month old dally cross bitch and are awaiting our dogs meeting her, and a home visit. We have a very big back garden which is fully secure but we don't have a 6 foot high fence, it's about four foot. Is that going to be okay? I'm really worried that the visitor will be insistent about us having a very high fence and refuse us.

If anyone could give any advice on this it would be great please!

Iv never had a visit from the RSPCA but I would think that the fence might be a problem, I dunno if they would refuse you but might advise you to change it before the dog lives with you so might do a second visit.

Good luck

Thank you, may rush to buy a higher one before they come then. Argh this is awful! Haha. Sometimes I wish I was the kind of person that didn't like animals, wouldn't have this stress! Thanks again.

I would think a 6 foot fence would be safer with a Dally cross, but hopefully as long as you tell them you are in the process of getting one, they won't insist you have it at the point of visiting.

A wooden fence, do you think? Just don't know if we can afford to pay the £1000 it would cost. I'll call them in the morning and see what they say. I'm really worried now.

> but we don't have a 6 foot high fence, it's about four foot.

Certainly a freind waws refused a Labrador because of this years ago by our RSPCA dogs home visitor.

We've found a way to do it without having to have the wooden fencing which would have just been a no go. Thanks

TBH, I never understood the six foot fence policy alot of rescues have. Many of my rescues would have NO problem scaling a 6 foot fence. I rehome to indoor homes only and my contract states that the dog has to be under supervision in the garden as well. If a dog is happy and doesnt have any issues then it makes no difference if the fence is two foot or six foot, IMHO.

That's the thing, my dogs are always under supervision when in the garden, our kitchen looks out on to it so we sit and watch them play out there. But the RSPCA will not listen to that, I can understand in a way why they're so strict but sometimes I think they run the risk of turning good homes down for silly reasons.

Maybe you need to point out to them that alot of dogs prefer to tunnel UNDER a fence if they really want to get out :-p.

Haha, you'd think wouldn't you! I have just got back from there and they were trying to put an older lady of around mid 60s off having a collie cross staff as they don't think the lady would be active enough - this is without looking at her details. It did make me a bit cross.

Gosh, good homes for Staffie x are so few and far between... :( I've rehomed Jack the Lad (RW) to a lovely elderly couple who came to me looking for a Springer Spaniel (they always had a Springer). They met Jack bumbling about in front of the house and she fell in love with him, her OH has always been afraid of RW's without any reason. They were the most unlikely couple to rehome a RW but it worked out great and now they bumble together ;).

Well the girl is actually the mum of the pup we've reserved, she was mated with a dalmatian. She is a gorgeous girl, so pretty and gentle but so very skinny. Would love to get my hands on the people that brought her in, the pup is 4 and a half months and had never been to the vet or been walked. Bless her.

It's quite ridiculous when you think about it, that there's a possibility you might be refused to home this dog just 'cause the fence might be too short, given the number of dogs in rescue.
You'll find that the RSPCA home visitor criteria will vary from area to area.  In my particular area the person currently in charge of homing will not allow anyone in a flat to home a dog, which is completely bonkers.  However, some of her home inspectors don't have a problem with dogs in flats, so fortunately, many have gone through ok.  Rather than rushing out and spending a fortune on new fencing, I'd see what they say.  If it is raised as a problem, then if you're willing to address the issue, tell them and work out a timescale.  In truth, the first few weeks of homing a rescue you're unlikely to kick her out to roam around the garden on her own anyway, so hopefully it wont be a problem.
Good luck - let us know how you get on.

I know, it does make me angry, especially as it's not a jumpy kind of breed like a beagle.
I'm taking one of our boys to meet her this morning, I will ask them then. What we will do rather than putting wooden fencing up is put wire fencing and attach galvanised mesh to the top to bring it up to 6 foot if we need to. That way it will only cost around £100 instead of ten times as much. She's not housetrained so we will need to go out in the garden with her a lot for a while until she is - crazy rules.
Thank you, I will do!

best of luck x

If a dog is happy and doesnt have any issues then it makes no difference if the fence is two foot or six foot, IMHO.

My dogs are very happy but a two foot fence would not even register to them that it was a barrier :-) Both my dogs are rescues and both have unsupervised access to the garden  which is enclosed by a six foot fence. In dry weather the back door is never shut and the dogs have unlimited access to the garden and they choose to spend a lot of time out in the garden. It would be impossible to always supervise them out there and let them enjoy the benefits of choosing to be outside if they so wish - I do have other commitments in my life as well as the dogs :-) They are never left out in the garden if nobody is home though - then they are shut indoors.

The rescue from which my dogs came from insisted on high fencing as they had no idea if the dogs were well practised in the art of escaping. Our larger rescue was just a pup when we got him so he was physically unable to scale the fence and has never tried to even though he can easily scale the groynes at the beach which are far higher. Our smaller dog was not a small pup when we got him and had never been out in a garden so everything out in the big wide world was new and exciting and his for the taking so a high fence was a necessity for him.

Taking on a rescue dog is far different to having a puppy from it's breeder and training it your way - one often doesn't know what one is taking on, as indeed the rescue does not always know for certain the full characteristics of the dogs they rehome, because these characteristics often change as a rescue settles in to it's new home and gains confidence.

Could you not fence off a smaller area for the dogs that has a higher fence and thus prohibit access to the rest of the garden?

If your 4' fence is wooden (sorry if you have already said what sort it is) then why not just add some 2' trellis to the top of it.  This looks attractive, still lets the sun through and gives you your 6' fence at a fraction of the cost.

They may seem crazy to you and sometimes I think blanket rules are unfair however -  when you've worked in rescue and a regular reason for dogs being returned is that they keep escaping from the garden (and jumping over a fence takes a lot less time than burrowing under :-D ) the you can undertstand slightly more why these rules are there in the first place.  My dogs are pretty much always supervised in the garden but that isn't the case the marjority of the time as people want their dogs to be able to go in and out freely.

These rules are not just put in place to be a pain to people they are there for a reason usually based ion the public in the first place so if you want to be annoyed with someone be annoyed with the peeople that dump dogs or take them back to rescues for rediculous reasons in the first place meaning there is the need for these rules not with the rescues that (for the most part) are trying to do the best by the dogs concerned.

By the way if you think a dog that is part staff collie and dally isn't going to have spring and jumping ability then you may be somewhat surprised.  Dallys are incredbily agile jumpers as are both ot the other breeds :-)

Goodluck with the home check.

Sorry, slightly off topic but the comments about jumpers made me smile

Does anyone else have dogs that are very capable of hurdling small mountains to get to the sofa, food bowl or loved one BUT when you are in the middle of a field trying to negotiate a tricky fence they all of a sudden pretend they can't even operate their legs!! ?

I have one that would willingly follow me anywhere but if I try to get him through/round/over in front of me it's like trying to push a cow through a needle.  Dogs eh :)

Good luck with the home check and fence dilemma

> I have one that would willingly follow me anywhere but if I try to get him through/round/over in front of me it's like trying to push a cow through a needle

One good reason to do agility with them :)

Daisy

Thank you everyone. One side of our garden is 6 foot wooden fencing, the other side is hedged but there are a couple of gaps so we have put wire fencing in there to make it safe, which is the four foot fence. What I think we're going to do is attach galvanised mesh to the top of it to bring it up to 6 foot. Will they be happy with that do you think?

Thanks again everyone advice is much appreciated :)

Have you considered deer netting, its made of very durable plastic so doesn't rust and is light and easy to put up. I think it's sometimes called jumbo release netting as well. Last summer I had to re-fence my large garden (including covering a hedge) and I did not have a £1000 for that, I bought a 100metres of 6ft tall deer netting for £89 off ebay and 25 8ft slim fence poles off the wood yard for £2.25 each, it worked out very reasonable and was quite quick to put up (invited the chums up for a slap up meal and then told them they were fencing the garden :) )

You're a lifesaver! Thanks so much for that!

Was driving along today and you suddenly popped into my head(think I was thinkng about fencing at the time!!!). How did the home visit go?

Imda,
If you are getting new fence, why not see how much if would be just to put a gravel board at the bottom. Helps stop them digging out.
Also could be cheaper.

Denese

Excuse the ignoramus but whats a gravel board?

Otterhound,
It is like a large light grey concrete panel that can slot in to godfathers (they are the concrete posts, ) you can have as many as you like then have the fence slotted on the top. The are not expensive, they stop the fence rotting also stop the dogs damaging the fence. they do also look smart. It is far easier than having a wall under your fence, anyone can fit them. Most fence suppliers have then. Places like Wicks do but! you might get them cheaper eles where.

Hi,

We didn't get the dog from the RSPCA unfortunately, as my youngest retriever took a dislike to her. We got a pup from a private rescue who Oscar met and liked, they did the home visit and it all went really well, thank you for asking. We just bought a higher wire fencing which is about 5 foot now and they were fine with it!