I went to set up an Electric fence to keep Asian Leopard cats enclosed. These are domestic cats but are very independant and look just like miniature leopards. They also tend to wander and go off hunting as their big cousins do. These are very beautiful to look at but they have been climbing an 8ft wall to escape on a regular basis.

I decided to simply scale down a scheme used for genuine leopards on chain link fences to stop them climbing over the top. This involved creating an earth wire by securing a 60cm strip of chicken wire along the top of the wall. This is then connected to the earth post and earth terminal of the mains electric fencing energiser.

Along the top of the wall 2 offsets were fixed with insulators to carry live wires 150 and 300 mm at 90 degrees to the top. These are both connected to the live terminal of a hotShock energiser.

The idea is the cat climbs the wall and comes into contact with both the chicken wire (the earth) and the live wire simultaneously, so completing the circuit. ZAP.

Within minutes of installing the fence it has been tested by the cats and they received a shock and backed off from it.One of them have tried twice in the following day - he was obviously selected as the fall guy - and they have now ceased trying to climb over the wall.

Yet another success for electric fences.