I've got a wood privacy fence around my yard and my plan is to remove every other board when SHTF so I can see anyone on the other side. I want to keep the fence itself because it does help with privacy now and when SHTF and I can also string razor wire across the top.
Our fence currently has small 2" holes drilled into it about every six feet that is right at the level of our dogs noses. I often see them standing there with their nose in a hole sniffing to 'see' what is on the other side of the fence and they will alert me to anything that isn't supposed to be there.

 

when SHTF and I can also string razor wire across the top

Same here.

I probably would also seek to alarm the wire using a thin magnet wire that if cut would sound the alarm. Thin wire so that even if someone doesn't cut it but climbs over (say they throw a rug over the razor wire to make it safer to climb over), the weight of the person breaks the magnet wire and sounds the alarm. Wrap it around the razor wire so that while it's not impossible to pull it out to cut the razor wire, it's harder, and if a person doesn't know why it's there, they might just ignore it.

Security should be in layers, and that's not our only layer.

 

Yes, they also keep you from seeing out.

They are not install it and forget about it. They require a lot of maintenance.

More likely to be damaged by high winds.

If someone were able to get inside the fence they would be hidden from view of the neighbors as they break in the house.
(sometimes nosy neighbors can be an asset)

But they are harder to climb over than other types of fences

 

If someone were able to get inside the fence they would be hidden from view of the neighbors as they break in the house.

The good part of this: If you paint the inside of your fence bright white an intruder would stand out more as a silhouette. Same with tree trunks and other objects.

 

I live in a middle class Houston suburb.

The front yards are open (don't like) but the back yards are fenced in.

I am sandwiched between two very bad areas and I like being able to see people coming, but I would also prefer people not looking at my house either.

Not long ago I was taking out some trash and some random dude came up to me shouting "Who lives here?" I just looked at him like What the Hell? and he said "It's a FREINDLY neighborhood" and then called me a bitch when I didn't reply. If I'd had a fence he wouldn't have seen me and I would have preferred that.

 

The front yards are open (don't like) but the back yards are fenced in.

I'm interested in the difference in cultures in this case.
This is the "peaches and coconuts" theory.
Americans are peaches. Open front fence and closed back fence.
In Russia, it's the other way around. A solid outer wall of the fence and a light chain-link fence between neighbors.
As a result, my street in the village looks like a ravine between two fences.

As they say, "A good neighbor is better than a bad relative."

 

I have a wooden slab fence I made with a chainsaw milling device. Not a privacy fence but it the “weak “ area of visability behind it heavily forested. My shtf fortifications addition will be nails and screws pointing up atop fence to hang up potential climb overs If it really gets that bad

 

Is the pic view of your family member's home...or the neighbor's home?

 

Neither, I just found a stock photo online to illustrate what I'm asking about. Ours looks very similar.

 

We put one in, mainly to keep the dog out of the neighbor's yards. I think it's a positive. Casual passersby can't see my garden, wood pile, etc.
It gives the dog a job to do... patrolling the perimeter.
There is a 1/8" gap between pickets, so you can easily see a person or movement on the other side.
They do require maintenance. Sealing every 3 to 5 years. Replacment of pickets and horizontals.
We did galvanized posts in concrete for rigidity and longevity.

 

Defensively speaking that's a hard no. If it's providing privacy for you, you're only providing concealment for an attacker and it's hardly a real barrier/hindrance.

All of the positive reasons OP listed are mostly hopes, not neccessarily facts depending on the individual- a fence can have the opposite effecf. First someone might think you have nicer things (seeing as you can afford a nice fence and all). if they don't believe you're at home and decide to try to break in, it protects them from prying eyes- and may embolden them etc. It can put you in someones mind just as easily as it can keep you out.

Also- you don't need a mirror or some sort of periscope to see through a fence... just any little hole- could be a bullet hole even. Put your eye, or a phones camera up to the hole and you can see right through. Very low chance of detection using that method- try it. Drill a hole in a board or poke a hole in something thin and hold it up to your face or phone camera.

Domestically speaking they are very nice have. I say get one, and have a plan for your SHTF scenario perhaps like @jfountain2 suggested- id add you might consider sharpening the ends and angling every other or so board outwards like a palisade- buy a few boxes of nails to turn whats left of your nasty looking fence into something nobody is gonna want to climb- or dont 🤷‍♂️ you can always just treat it as extra firewood or window boarding material if worse comes to worst.

 

id add you might consider sharpening the ends and angling every other or so board outwards like a palisade

Ooh I really like that idea

 

I have a privacy fence around my back yard. Everyone does here. I like it. It keeps what I am doing in the yard out of sight. If I did have a small garden it would make it hard to see what I am growing if things get bad. Plus if I catch someone in my back yard it makes it hard for the neighbors to see how I deal with them.

I do suggest that you keep a small box or step ladder or something you can move around so you can pop up your head and look over the fence. Its nice to have a little better view than just looking through the cracks. Or maybe have a raised platform to stand on like they did in old west forts so you could look over the stockade pickets.

 

Those things require a lot of maintenance. They aren’t cheap to build and they aren’t cheap to maintain.

I recently took mine down and replaced it with a five foot chain link. I couldn’t be happier.

 

I also put up a 6 foot chain link fence around the back also, wood is too much work for upkeep.

 

I saw a lot of wood privacy fences blown apart when Idalia came through here. Chain link is a better long term option...in my opinion.

 

Thats why chain link fencing is sometimes referred to as "Hurricane Fencing" Its pretty wind proof. As an insurance adjuster I have seen a LOT of wood fence blown down and also chewed up by hail where hail beat the top of the pickets apart.

I have also seen a lot of crushed chain link when trees or tree limbs fell on it. Also some chain link blown down when enough debris was blown against it so that it acted like a sail and tried to stop the wind. In Odessa Tx I looked at one guys block wall fence that had a section blown over from high winds. He had a fortress of sorts for his wife. He traveled to Russia sometimes and wanted a safe place for her. His fence also had cameras and barbed wire mounted on the top of the walls.

You just never know what wind will do. I have seen some strange wind damage before.

 

I live in an urban area. People have a right to be in the public spaces around other people's homes just like I do. I have a right to protect myself and others from death or great bodily injury anywhere I can legally be.
I like fences and even privacy fences or at least borders of vegetation along the curtilage. Vegetative obstacles and fences that exclude easy passage into areas of my yard that I want no strangers just casually walking into. If somebody is inside my private spaces and they had to make great effort to get past my barriers to get into those spaces, I can probably fear for my life or great bodily harm. Like me, they can't target what they can't see. If violence is a threat within my private property boundaries then I've failed to protect my perimeter. You must define your curtilage so others know that those areas are private spaces and they're not welcome without invitation.

 

Ever since Honduras, I've lived in fully fenced or walled and gated homes. We had a 4 house compound on about two acres, surrounded by an 8 ft adobe wall with broken glass on top and massive rolling steel car gates, When I lived at the beach in Cali, where the houses were literally 6 feet apart, a wall was required to keep the hoi polloi out. We had a lot of crime there, literally a million people a year came to "my" beach 4 doors away. It was like living in a fish bowl. The wall gave us a tiny perimiter to define our space.

Our current house has block walls on three sides, the back is waist high wrought iron on a steep ridge line overlooking the riff raff about 250 ft below. It's possible to climb the cliff, but it's like one step up, slide two back. Too much work for the average burglar. We had cactus outside the back wall but it died and I don't think irrigating the slope is a good idea, so I'm working on a new plan. Maybe flaming punji sticks...

Even with the cliff we've had two incursions by low life's in back and a drone hovering right off the fence looking into our house. No place is entirely safe.

My front wall is solid poured stuccoed block. Nothing short of a buldozer is coming through. The weak point is the gates, which are wrought iron. Putting solid steel would be prohibitively expensive, and would affect our resale value. The downside is the HOA limits us to 6'. Our city outlawed razor wire as "dangerous." Too bad they didn't outlaw outlaws...

Anyway, I like the peace of mind of a defensible perimiter. Yes, someone could hide behind our wall, but I won't be defending from inside if I can help it. My front wall is mainly to make the Jehovas Witness ladies think nobody's home, and thwart drive bys as my enemies pile up. My goal is to be a harder target than the neighbors, but not so hard we look ripe for plucking.

Which are you going to hit first? The house with a wall and landscape lights all night, or the place down the street with a boat and SxS on trailers behind an unlatched gate, who are too cheap to even leave a light on?

 

I have a solid 7ft corrugated iron fence for privacy. I live in a rural area and have no fear of attacks.

PS The neighbor has the same fence.

 

Interesting material for your fence. I like it!

 

Where I'm at fences out front are limited to 4'. No restrictions on hedges. I planted flowering hedges that my honey bees love. A win, win in my book.

 

Yay or Nay?
Yay. Maybe put this on top of your ''Privacy Obstacle'' in SHTF. Amazon.com

 

I don't put up fences that reroute wildlife & certainly not of a material that has a limited life even with constant maintenance.

 

I have a seven foot tall wire lifestock type fence to keep the deer from eating my fruit trees and to keep stray dogs away from my chickens which are behind another six foot chicken wire fence...so far the neighborhood bear hasn't torn down any fencing since the wild cherries are in the unfenced front yard.
I am of an age where limited life fencing is probably going to last longer than me...

 

Our fence is chain link and it's only to keep the dogs in the backyard and it would be easy to climb over at which time the dogs would alert us, we have no neighbors behind or alongside due to our orchards so it would be more of a problem with someone hiding behind trees.
A wooden privacy fence isn't bad if you have dogs because they will bark at the spot where a person is or if a shooter pops up, he just found out that a wooden fence is not bullet proof could also plant thorny bushes on the backside.

 

What do you think? Is a wooden privacy fence a help or hindrance if it hits the fan?

We're guests on a rural property. The family member who owns the property has been installing privacy fence. This is great while the grid is up, but I fear it'll be a liability if the grid goes down, because it offers concealment to someone who might shoot over the fence at us. It would be trivial to place a small ladder and wait for someone to exit the house. They'd barely be visible, especially if they held up a mirror for a periscope then they pop up and shoot.

The positives:

• Passers-by won't see what we're doing unless they peek over
• A fence of any kind sets boundaries
• Keeps honest people honest
• If someone is just walking by, might keep us out of their minds

View attachment 583596

Caltrops sprinkled the other side will fix that, you'll hear them.
They'll be moving a bit slower after that.

 

I have a stockade type of fence around my back yard and a dog-eared fence between the garage and deck. 2 access gates that can be locked. I replaced 150 feet of the OG fence last year that was put up in 1996. It ran me around $3200.

On 2 sides, I back up to state land that is heavily overgrown. On the inside on the side next to my remote neighbor I have Pyracantha bushes planted (aka fire thorn), a solid hedge of it. Good luck getting mixed up in that. I have a couple of boxes of barbed wire (and gloves) in the garage, ready to put up if that day comes.

 

I'd forget about people shooting at you. It will help to keep burglars out, and it will keep dogs out. If someone is hiding behind it, they probably can't see what you are doing on the other side. They can't shoot through it anyway, not accurately.

 

Vegetative screening or some type of screening would make it harder for raiders or JBT's to target you from positions outside of your property. Like happened in Minneapolis.
VIDEO of police and National Guard forcing residents into their home for the governor's curfew.
JBT's fire on residents on their own property.

 

I have one around our primary outdoor living area. Uniquely difficult to get over. When we’re out, dogs are too. Ours is for concealment, not cover.

 

I built a fence around my courtyard mainly for privacy. The area is about 15x40. I decided I didn't want to have a lot of maintenance so I built it to look like the exterior of the house and used cement boards (Hardiplank). The only maintenance is the wood structure holding the boards and paint. The pros outweigh the cons.

 

Working for elec utility, I hate privacy fences if thats where the meter is.

I am the odd-ball as I respect the property owners and will ring their bell even if all I need is a 30second meter read. I want the, to know I'm on property even though the truck is all identified up, flashy light on the roof is going and I'm dressed in all things employer. Bosses say I eat up too much time. I tell them its cheaper than being shot.

Back to fences. Figure 3/4 of the property owners are not home during regular workimg hours, but I still have a job to do. Such fencing restricts me from seeing if there is a Fido in the yard. Even when there is, most of the time I can befriend them. Alot of times, short fencing allows me to see the reading with the binoc's, and I'm done. Tall fencing restricts that too.

But what makes me more worrisome of the fences is not the sight restriction, but the gates. Dogs, chickens, goats, potbellied pigs, all know when that gate opens, and they know there something really cool on the other side. My bigger concern is critter gets out. With shorter fences, I can go over the top if need be without risk of escaped livestock.

What I've witnessed with wooden privacy fences is there seem to be 2 kinds. One is well kept and looks very nice. The other, either due to age and/or neglect, is falling apart. Gates have deformed digging into the ground, slats are warping in different directions, local bandits have chewed the bottom of a couple slats to gain entry into the back yard, posts are rotting away and the whole fence can move.

I have seen some really cool decorative wooden fences. I was at a place a couple years ago and the fella had cut animal shapes out of his fencing. Wish I had had thought of a quick photo with the phone. It was a beautiful. Probably pretty labor intensive to originally create.

 

I won’t build a privacy fence like that.
Too much stress in the wind.
One made with boards staggered on each side still gives privacy, allows to see if f someone is close to it, AND isn’t apt to uproot/break in a wind.

Another way is to put board’s horizontally (louvre like) on about a 45-60 degree angle. Lets anyone on inside see what’s close to the fence if vantage point is higher.