[Bangbang]

There have been a lot of posts recently about electric fencing.
I began to wondering that with today's technology if the process is the
right way round.

What about putting an electric collar / anklet onto the animal.
So when it approaches a sensor it gives off an acoustic warning - then a small  electrical shock.

The sensor wire could be buried like the system used on trolley locks in supermarkets.
I think the animal (pig or sheep) would soon respond to the 'sound' alarm hence so
it wouldn't get a shock.

With today's battery technology I am sure this could be accomplished.

No more fencing or repairs etc animals hurt in fencing.....

So where are the problems going to be with this concept?
Has it been tried before?

[funkyfish]

 This exists for pets. It's used alot in the states where people don't have fences in their gardens.
It's not a good idea as the animal has to test the boundries several times before working out where they can't go. Would not be able to be used for strip grazing or moving pens around a field. With a fence the animal knows the fence gives the shock and stays away from anything that looks like it. With a collar a plane or car may pass near by or something else like aloud noise and then the animal gets shocked- it may well associate it with the shock, not the boundary. It's bad animal welfare really. Imagin your sheep in a field with a collar on, you spook them they run to the boundary, they get shocked- chances of ever catching them again?

[Bangbang]

good points...my intentions are not to cause stress or suffering
but what stops them running into an electric fence when spooked?
Do animals not learn bounderies - seen or unseen ?

[deepinthewoods]

still use a fence, but with sensors on the fence to trigger the shock, the animal just carries the battery, blinding idea m8

[robert waddell]

if an animal is spooked or chased it will take all in front of it  breaking legs and ripping flesh in the process

[Bangbang]

My idea is to create a virtual electric fence so no animals get tangled etc.
When you touch an electric fence do you not automatically pull away from it - not into it.

[Small Farmer]

My rescue spaniel was "trained" with an electric collar before being abandoned.   He's scared of the horses, the sheep, the chickens and his own shadow.  Nasty things - very easy to misuse.

The dog versions cost £20-25 each which doesn't sound like a cheap solution given what my sheep do with their tags.   If it works it could also create invisible boundaries on the land which would make flexible grazing rather difficult, or indeed just moving them around.

[Bangbang]

My idea is not designed around these pet collars...we don't want to train
sheep to keep away from horses etc..just to stay in there allocated areas.

The hyperthetical cable does not have to be buried - just chew proof!
so you can move it around

[hughesy]

If I'm not mistaken the dog version of this kind of thing has been made illegal here in Wales. Rightly so too.

[Bangbang]

Sheep does not wear collar touches electric fence shock!
Sheep wears collar / anklet goes near boundery wire shock!
whats the difference?

[Small Farmer]

The difference is the animal can't see whats causing the pain.   

[Bangbang]

If you read my initial post, the animal is given an audible signal as he approaches
the shock point.
Remember my ' mad idea ' I posted is so that we can all apply our minds to it as to
come up with a possible solution to help the fencing problem and animal welfare.
I posted an idea not a solution - all heads working together we might achieve one

[Small Farmer]

I understand that.  Since the precedent with dog training exists one has to look at it though, and some of the collars do just what you suggest by creating a warning before a shock.  However all such devices say that a training process needs to be gone through with each dog and it is hard to see how to achieve that with any numbers of sheep or pigs.

My concern is that my ESS is severely traumatised.   He has a lot of behavioural problems - he proceeds in a series of anticlockwise circles rather than in a straight line, and if anything unexpected happens he withdraws and closes down.   He entirely lacks aggression, never barks or growls and is very friendly to all dogs, people and children.  But outside his limited comfort zone he stops coping and freezes.

There is an established welfare case against the canine variety so I'm struggling to see what could be done with a farm animal version where individual training and monitoring would be necessarily much lower for animals we don't normally train.

[doganjo]

With respect, Small Farmer, your dog has been mistrained, as I think you mentioned earlier.  That dog has been maltreated.  No place for using an e-collar in that way.

That is a different type of collar form what is being mooted by Bangbang.  However, I also know that something similar to what he suggests was used by friends of mine, Pete and Margaret,  some years ago(1990s) for  both sheep and dogs, when they bought their farm to build up a quarantine business.

Their yard was unfenced when they moved in and needed some protection for their dogs.  Pete bought a roll of cable, buried it in a circle around the yard under the grass, and placed a few fence posts along the line with a single wire between them to indicate where the fence was.  The two dogs had sensors attached to their collars  which gave out a loud warning noise (no shock) when they went near the 'invisible' fence.  They learned very quickly to stay away from it, even without the collars on, and he even took the post and wire fence down.

He then bought some Jacob sheep and decided to 'strip' graze them using the same method.  And it worked using the lead male and lead female

What impressed me was that when they got some more dogs they didn't need to move the cable back to the yard or put sensors on the new dogs - they seemed to learn from the original two setters to stay at least a yard away from the edge of the grass where the buried cable had been - even when friends came to visit.

What I found even more impressive was that the Jacobs learnt to recall to Pete's piercing whistle.   One whistle adn they came running!  Never knew a man quite like him.

And yes, I think they may have been banned in Wales but not yet in England or Scotland, not sure about Northern Ireland.

[tizaala]

Pigs are just as likely to run forwards as backwards when alarmed, how are you supposed to make the contact with a sheep ? keep them shaved?. dogs have had severe burns from these devices, well documented. you must have witnessed a startled animal trying to run through a fence, an electric shock will drive them in any direction. So no, it isn't a mad idea, it's a bloody stupid one, it's right up there with the diesel engined wedding cake.