A Visit to the Forest and a Finished Fence

On Veteran's Day, Evan had off from work so we decided to do a little exploring and take the dogs to the Kanawha State Forest. It was an overcast day and most of the leaves were brown but it was still beautiful. The dogs really enjoyed the outdoors time, even Baxter. He did well enough to be off his leash most of the time. We hiked for about an hour and then went to check out the firing range we had seen a sign for. We didn't get out and shoot but there were quite a few people there. Here are some pictures:

Jersey, Baxter and Evan on the trail

A sealed off old coal mine

It was pretty chilly but still beautiful!

When we got home, the fence was finished! We had figured that with the progress they had made that morning that it would probably be finished that afternoon but I decided not to get my hopes up. Sure enough, that evening, we finally had a fenced yard for the dogs. Evan and I both noticed a potential problem with the fence right away. Basically, there was about a 10 inch opening by the gate. The guys had stopped the fence that ran along the back wall just short of making a corner with the gate on the ground. We decided to just try it out since the dogs would have to jump about three and a half feet up to get through the opening. The couple of nights later, we left the dogs outside when we went to run a few errands. We were only gone about an hour and a half but when we got back the dogs were gone. After we left, the sun had set and no doubt, Jersey caught sight of something on the other side of the fence and decided to go after it. I was surprised that Baxter was gone too. I didn't think he would make the jump. We ran upstairs from the driveway and out into the backyard. We determined very quickly that they had to have made it by jumping the wall because there were no signs of digging anywhere. We called for them for what seemed like a long time. A couple of minutes later, we heard them coming from up the hill behind our yard. They both ran back and jumped back into the yard through the opening. Thankfully, they were safe and didn't have any injuries. I was actually surprised by how upset I was over the thought that they were both lost. Evan found an oversized brick and put it in the opening until we could make it to the store to get some cinder blocks. It didn't cover the entire opening but based on our dogs' personalities, we figured they would be freaked out about knocking it over therefore wouldn't try to jump out again.

The next night, I let them out for their routine bathroom break before we all were to go to bed. I heard Baxter barking so I ran downstairs just in time to see Jersey knock over the brick and jump the wall. Baxter stayed this time but I quickly called for Evan to help get Jersey to come back. I got him a flashlight and he took off running after her up the hill. You could hear her tearing around amongst the trees, bushes, and leaves behind our house after some animal no doubt. Evan finally corralled her to come back home but not before she collected quite a few stickers. So much for the quick fix!

When Evan's parents were in town for Thanksgiving, they helped us come up with a solution. A few cinder blocks and coat hangers later and  now the dogs can't get out anymore. One modification to the design was required when the dogs pushed their way through the gate and met us on the driveway last week, but hopefully all the kinks have now been worked out.