Fencing as a Sound Barrier for Barking Dogs

How Sound Barriers Work

• The simplest way to understand sound is as vibrational energy. When you say "hello" or your dog barks or the doorbell rings, the air around you vibrates. Specialized receptors in your ears pick up these vibrations and transmit information about them to your brain, causing you to perceive sound. And like any vibration, sound can be "stopped" by physically reflecting or absorbing it.

Fencing Barriers

• In general, the more solid the material, the better the barrier. That's why masonry materials such as brick, stone or concrete tend to make the most effective sound barrier fences. Wooden privacy or "stockade" fences are useful as well and are more practical for many homeowners.

  Discussing fencing as a solution to noise problems in "This Old House Magazine," Boston-based acoustical engineer Eric Wood recommends sound barrier fences be as solid as possible, as sound will flow through any holes. Fences should reach all the way to the ground and should be as high as local regulations and aesthetics allow.

Greenery Barriers

• Plants reflect and absorb a small amount of sound and can work well in tandem with fencing barriers. In "Green Scene," his column for "The Washington Post," landscape designer Joel Lerner recommends planting a mixture of evergreen plants with thick foliage. (Dog owners should be sure that any plant they choose for their yard is nontoxic to their pets.)

  Lerner points out that the benefits of a greenery barrier may be as much psychological as physical--they block the view of whatever is making the noise, giving homeowners a sense of privacy and protection.