For those with dams, how do you keep your young children safe?

[milklady]

Hi all,

We are moving to a rural block in the Perth hills in about 2 years time, and it has a large and very deep dam on it. I am concerned about our childrens safety, our youngest will be about 2.5 yrs old when we move there. The water in the dam is very cloudy (it was dug in white clay) and I am worried that should one of the kids go missing, you couldn't even see if they fell in! :(

Is it a crazy or outrageous idea to fence it?? It would give me such peace of mind! Has anyone done this? Otherwise how do you cope with a dam on your block and young children?

TIA :o

[NonnyMouse]

I'll be keeping an eye on this one. We're looking at buying somewhere, but so far I'm ruling out all places with a body of water on it (whether it be a creek or a dam) because I don't like the idea of having one with two young children here.

[Guest1234]

I think your best bet would be to fence it. Fil had his dam fenced off so the grandchildren could safely wander around his property without the dam being a danger.

[OJandMe]

How far away from the house is the dam??

We have our dam on the other side of the driveway... the dam side of the driveway is fenced.

The kids know they are not to go near the dam.

At my house (and I know I'm going to get shot for this) it's a wooden spoon offence to go near the dam.

O and J have been on the receiving end once since we moved here a year ago... they quickly decided the dam wasn't worth the wooden spoon.

G and J2 don't go over there because they follow O and J around.. and also because the fence on the other side of the driveway is enough of a deterrent to stop them going through the paddock near the water tank.

And vigilance. Just be vigil.

[Opinionated]

We had our dam fenced and told the kids that there was a crocodile in there. We even watched a show about crocodiles. It's a bit mean to lie, but it was for their own safety. They were so scared of the dam, they wouldn't even go near that side of the property.

[notquitesupermum]

do you plan on keeping animals? if you fence the dam they wouldnt be able to get there to drink.
We have a couple of dams (one of which is usually dried up) both are a reasonable distance from the house.
The one closest to the house always has water in it but it is in a fenced paddock, the fences arent 'pool fence' kind of safe but they are sheep fences so they have close strained wires and chook wire around them. If you werent tall enough to step through the top two wires you would need to climb over at a post or gate. I have difficulty doing this sometimes.
Our house is also fenced off from the remainder of the property.
So while access to the dams isnt completely kiddy proof fences and gates etc would definately slow them down abit.
When bubs does come along he will be taught to swim and the dangers of water ASAP too.

[OJandMe]

We had our dam fenced and told the kids that there was a crocodile in there. We even watched a show about crocodiles. It's a bit mean to lie, but it was for their own safety. They were so scared of the dam, they wouldn't even go near that side of the property.

:laughing: OMG I love it!!!!!

[milklady]

Thanks guys.

Our block is only 7.5 acres, it is a long shaped block, the dam is at the front of the block, and the house is at the back. We also have a little (winter only) dam near the house, and we are filling that one in. But yes I think that for our peace of mind we might look into fencing the big dam. We wont be keeping animals so that won't be a problem. We may possibly be extending our family in the future so it is probably the best thing to do. And I do like the sound of the crocodile story! That would probably work quite well for little DS2 but probably not for 9 year old DS1 :laughing:

I really appreciate your replies everyone, I've been worrying about this for ages.

[Pina Colada]

We bought a 5 acre property 4 years ago to run as a flower farm. We didn't live there, but my parents did, and we were there every weekend, and as DD1 wasn't in school, I was often there all week. It had a dam on a neighbouring property 10m away from the house. It was fenced along the side boudary, but only a barbed wire fence along the front boundary only another 10m or so away.

Also it had an irrigation channel fronting the property 20m from the house. Right along the driveway.

We had all external doors locked up high so kids couldn't even reach the lock with a chair. We had the backyard fenced with no gate, so we knew they were safe in there. Constant vigilance. And paranoia.

And I agree with OJandMe, to go near the channel or dam would be wooden spoon material.

We also told them (when they were old enough) that it was 'dangerous' water.

[FionaV]

Our dam is fenced off from the house yard, so the children can't just wander in there. Once on the other side of the fence, they were always with an adult or older child when they were that small. We don't have a lot of stock - only a house cow and couple of calves.

[Baldie's Mum]

My DH grew up on 200,000 acres with mulitple dams. None of them fenced cause they ran sheep. I asked nan about it, and she said that you just were tought that the dams are dangerous. Even for supervised swimming, dams are just yuck and not safe. Full of poo and other stuff. If you wanted to go swimming, you go to the pool in town.

7.5acres is pretty big, you would notice your child gone, waaaaay before 2 acres! LOL!

Is the house area fenced?

[kuddles]

I grew up on the farm and never went near dams without Mum or Dad.
When we were little (under 5) we weren't allowed outside without a parent. When we got a bit bigger we were limited to the yard and had to always stay together and were instructed to dob if one of us broke the rules. Any rule breaking was a smacking/ privilege loosing offence.

If you have a strong good house fence then that would be a great start. :)

[Blueberry Crumble]

I would not take the risk. Even if they know they will get a smack for going near the dam, children will still push the boundaries. A two year old wont understand anyway, and I would definetely be getting a good fence put around it!

[HART]

Great thread and great ideas. We are planning on moving our 5 acres which has a natural slope ideal for a dam but the whole water and kids factor scares me. I grew up on a farm with multiple dams, a creek and a river, we even used to swim in a couple of the dams and the river - with supervision of course but it never really was an issue - we grew up knowing that dams are dangerous and not to go to the dam by ourselves. Saying that though there is no way I would trust my middle son - he is only one and a half and I can so see the mischievous streak in him... I will be checking this thread later to see if any one else can suggest any more ideas.

[emmwill]

Have your children during a drought.
Our house is between a dam and a creek and before I had children I was always terrified how I would keep my children out of the creek. Well it has not run since we were married. Problem solved!

Ok sensible answer. From an early age our children have all been taught not to go outside of the yard. It is quite a large yard and they just know not to.

Another thing we did was we showed them yabbies caught from the dam. DS who is very adventurous(sp) will not even put a toe in a dam for fear of the nippers that eat meat!!!


I would personally be making sure the yard is secure. Just because your dam is fenced does not mean the next dam is and children can wander. But if your yard is well fenced they can not get away to explore. All of my friends with kids do the same. Good quality yard fences.

[milklady]

The little winter dam near the house was filled in this week, so glad we won't have to worry about that one!

We dont have a fenced area around the house, we will have to look into that too I think.

I didn't think of the yabbies though, the big dam is full of them! They would definately look scary enough to a 2-3 year old! Thanks emmwill thats a good idea.

Thanks for your thoughts and advice guys :)

[Kelsarni]

I agree with everyone else. Your better off putting in a secure yard around the house and make that absolutly impossible for the kids to excape from.

Or you'll need to invest in some very good fencing to prevent the kids getting into the dam. Your standard box wire or similar is very easy for a child to slip under or through even if done very very well.

[milklady]

Thanks Kelsarni, DP and I have been discussing this recently, the only way we would fence the dam is by levelling the edges with a bobcat, then installing proper pool fencing.

[MimiGrace]

i would do really good fencing around the yard that they'll be playing in, and not around the [individual] dams.

i spent most of my childhood at my friends, on a 50+ acre property of bush, with about 10 dams within walking distance (which we would go to unsupervised from quite a young age). and none of them fenced - but we had parents who were super insistant on proper swimming lessons/water safety etc.

and no going into the water ever (i'd probably even agree with OJ's mum on this - wooden spoon offence!), unless fully supervised etc. until we were around 8 or 9.

the yabby trick wouldn't have worked on me as a child - we knew there were yabbies, so we would try to catch them :hair: so scary to look back on it with the mind of a childcarer now - i hope it works on your kids though!