How We Blocked a Bad View and Created Privacy

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Corrugated Metal Fence For Privacy

The deer used to get in our backyard and eat everything. All of our flowers. All of our vegetables. So a few years ago we enclosed the yard with a wire fence tall enough to keep them out. It’s worked perfectly for the deer.

Last year, after pampering our two cherry trees, we were excited at the thought of how big our bounty would be. We checked our cherries every day, watching them ripen, until the big day finally arrived. We were ready, and so were those gorgeous cherries. We gathered our boxes and went out to pick them just in time to see a big raccoon slide down the trunk of one tree and slink over our fence. He’d eaten almost every cherry. We ended up with a measly handful each. Grrr. I hope your stomach ached, Rocky!

I swear between the critters and the weeds; it feels like a constant battle to tame our backyard sanctuary, but we persist because we love spending time out there. When the weather is good, you’ll find us in our backyard, relaxing, listening to birdsong and enjoying the beauty. Except…

We Need A Fence

Even with neighbours on either side of us, our backyard is still very private. One neighbour is behind a thick hedge that divides us, and the other neighbour is in full view through the wire fence but his house is on the other side of the road and he only has a storage shed that we can see…and a few stored boats, and a trailer, and an old canoe, and some old stacks of lumber and then there are those large rusty oil drums. No, you can’t miss those.

Oh boy! ! Instead of enjoying our pretty flowers our eyes kept settling on all of that, um, let’s call it stuff. Something had to be done.

Some type of fence was needed. Our choice was to use dark grey corrugated metal panels framed in with stained wood. We like our neighbour and still want to say hi when he’s out in the yard so we decided not to go too high. Just high enough to hide the “stuff”.

Building and Adding The New Fence

Before the pandemic, it wasn’t a big deal to go down to the local hardware stores and pick up pretty much anything you needed on the spot, but when we tried to find the corrugated metal, we discovered we had to order it in advance. Finally, after waiting for 3 weeks, it was back in stock and ready for pickup.

We already had the wire fence and fence posts and incorporated the existing fence posts for our new fence.

The How To:

John added wood railing across the top and along the bottom of the original fence. Next, he screwed in some upright support posts every two feet.

Later, we fastened the corrugated metal pieces to these support posts.

It took several 10ft to 12ft sections of the corrugated metal panels for our new fence. I’ll warn you now; they are heavy and awkward to handle. It’s definitely a two-man job. Wear gloves. The edges are sharp.

One panel was fastened horizontally on top of the other to cover the height of our new fence. The top panels were relatively easy to attach. Using his impact driver, John attached the panels using special coated screws with neoprene washers for a waterproof seal.

Scribing Metal Panels

Each of the bottom panels had to be cut to fit the contour of our backyard. Our yard slopes, so every bottom panel is a different size and shape. Plus, we had large rocks and trees to work around.

Scribing the bottom sections to our landscaping slope and then cutting the pieces with a zip cutter blade attached to the grinder, was probably the most time consuming, but it paid off when each panel was a perfect fit.

Making It Pretty

The wood railings were all stained before we added them.

Then, wherever there was a seam in the corrugated metal panelling, John added a wooden post to cover it.

To give each post a more polished look, we added a wooden cap to the top.

finished fence — We love our finished privacy fence!

Now. What to do about that racoon?!

Look Close

If you zoom in on this picture you may spot John snoozing in the hammock. He deserves it!