It actually was not complete in this picture. The fence is in the mountains in Los Gatos Ca.. Lots of wildlife and a lot of deer. See how the posts are extended in the picture, 2' above the top rails (2x4s) we installed black vinyl barb-less wire every foot to the top which is 8'. I do not have a picture of when we finished that part of this fence as I just looked. Here is some information that is interesting: we could have run the wire 3' above the solid Howard wire fence. A deer will not jump through an opening. Ill attach a pic of a true deer fence. 8' is the magic number. I build a lot of vineyard fences and deer will get over a 7' fence if they see something that looks tasty. A true deer fence galvanized is what is called graduated wire. The holes on the bottom are 2x4"s and as it gets higher the hole size graduates to 3"x 3" the 5"x 5"s. And you dig down about 6"s and bury the wire in the ground. A trick I picked up in the hole we cut the wire on the bottom of the fence every few inches and pull it away from the fence in the hole. It keeps rabbits and other critters from digging. Once they hit the sharp side of the wire they give up fast. It really does work. The bottom pic is another fence with barb-less wire on top. Dogs will not jump that fence with the barb-less wire and a squirrel, well as you know a squirrel can get into about anything it wants. Their squirrely..lol. When you see an animal climbing across a telephone wire....they go where they want. There is another method for keeping squirrels out but its not a fence. This is a 6' welded wire fence to keep dogs and small animals in or out. But deer will jump it with ease. The fence below has barb-less wire as the first fence had. Click on the picture to see the barb-less wire. By extending the tops 2" you can turn a 6' horse fence into an 8' deer fence. Using welded wire as shown in another post on top. As for snakes the only thing I have find that works in the 30 years is snake wire. Thanks for pointing that out in the pic. Have a wonderful life!

Suzi, I have seen several around town here that I liked (moon gates, I think). I agree, the octopus is so cool! Cyn, Arcy, The gate will comply with code, of course. One can probably make most of the gates pictured here code compliant. We have had pools since we bought our first home and put one in. So it's not our first rodeo. Roarah, to meet height reqmts, we will be three rails high as well. Not to put too fine a point on it, but probably where our pool fence would abut the neighbors', rather than having back to back split rail, we will have just mesh or somesuch. The side that faces our house, where the entry gate is, will be split rail with mesh, as will the side perpendicular to that. The last side, which faces the ocean, will probably be a haha in the wild grasses. I am not sure what material that will be. Prob split rail again so it looks good in winter. KSWL, yes, I do too. But I need to show the landscape architect because we would have to move the whole fence forward to be able to have that recess. As it is now, stone steps begin just the other side of the gate. Rob, We have had pools in other homes, so kind of used to it. Plus we don't really have many neighbors. We are kind of tucked back in from the main road, and there are only three other houses here, quite far apart, each on 2 to 5 acres, and 2 have pools already. Lyban, Thanks, that is a good point. Outside, I totally agree that a totally solid gate looks a bit off with the open fence. I like"roarah's gate" vm too, but it will kind of disappear. It is shown in a small expanse, in a sort of intimate setting. By contrast, when you arrive at our home, this will be in the distance some. TIbb, I agree. It's such a pain even locking doors with the salt air. Daisy, yes. We always planned on a flowering vine, but in some choices they really dominate! Heretofore I told the landscape architect that all i want is blue hydrangea, but I want a ton of them. I know there is climbing hydranagea, too. Local, I was (believe it or not), trying to cut down on all the details when describing the fence, but in fact it will have three rails on the side where the gate is. Oddly, the side where we border the neighbor with the two rail, it might look like that is our fence, too, but we will have mesh or wire there. Thank goodness we have a lot of vegetation to fudge with this, and we are not going for a manicured look at all. Show us your project!

Very, very unlikely that you have any dangerous snakes in your yard. In fact, it was probably a garter snake, sometimes called a "garden snake" and they just eat mostly big bugs from your garden and are very scared of you and will slither away if given the slightest opportunity. The stones and bricks probably attract just as many snakes as any plants. You don't need to have a yard devoid of landscaping or plants to avoid snakes. Your cheapest and easiest option for a small patio are large (12 inch and sometimes you can even find bigger ones) cement pavers. They cost a couple of bucks each, and you don't need that many. There are many ways to put in a patio like that, but the best way is to dig down, put a layer of special rough gravel, tamp it down, fill with pavers and then sweep sand over it between the cracks. You could do it in one weekend. Directions can be found in any good landscaping book at the library or just google "cement paver patio." You can edge it with wood if you like. Then put out some cheap colorful plastic planters with colorful flowers, like your grandkids drew. And if it were me, I'd scour the second hand and garage sale and garden stores for fun metal or wood things to hang on the fence. I found a metal sun sculpture with bells on it in the trash one time, for example. Mulch the rest with good cedar mulch and call it a day, that way you won't have to mow. Or do grass for the rest, and use a weed whacker like I did in my tiny urban "lawn."

You might not like this answer, but as soon as you put pavers in, you have to keep up with the adjacent grass/weeds. You cut grass in a small area with a string trimmer. Or you could spray around the paver with RoundUp to keep the grass/weeds from encroaching. Yes you can use the concrete pavers from HD or Lowe's. We did this, but we don't have children kicking stones around. Those are 18x24 stones from Lowe's with 3/4-inch chipped stone in between. It's all held together with steel landscape border, also from Lowe's. The chipped stones lock together and don't flow around like rounded pea gravel does. Another thing we did and would do again is place is use these paver base panels. At $13 (Lowe's) each they seem expensive, but they saved a lot of time preparing a base for a level paver. We spent days prepping for our first walkway and only a couple hours prepping with these base panels. If that area is constantly moist, you're watering too much. Your entire yard should dry out completely before watering. I'm not saying the plants should be dead, but the soil under the lawn, for example, should have been dry for at least a few days before watering. If it is still wet, you don't need to water.