Dog Ear Fence Picket Calculator

Multiply your fence length by 2.18 for standard 5.5 inch pickets butted tight, then add 10 percent for waste. A 150 ft run works out at about 319 pickets, or 351 with waste. Subtract gate openings from the run first — they take a gate frame, not pickets.

Seventeen at 5.5 inches wide butted tight, sixteen with a quarter inch gap, and fifteen with a half inch gap. Pre-built 8 ft panels are usually sold with 16 or 17 pickets for exactly this reason.

A nominal 1x6 dog ear picket measures 5.5 inches actual, and a 1x4 measures 3.5 inches. Always calculate with the actual width. Using the nominal 6 inches leaves your order about 8 percent short, which on a 150 ft fence is roughly 25 missing pickets.

Bundle and pallet counts vary a great deal by supplier — commonly 100 to 120 boards a bundle for 6 ft dog ear, with a pallet running 200 to 300. There is no industry standard, so confirm the count with your yard before ordering rather than assuming.

None at all if the lumber is wet from the yard, because treated pine shrinks and opens its own eighth to quarter inch gap as it dries. Use a quarter to half inch if the boards are already dry or you want a spaced picket look rather than a privacy screen.

Six feet is the standard for privacy fencing, with 4 ft and 5 ft sold for shorter runs and 8 ft available in some markets. The picket height is the fence height — the posts run longer because a third of the post goes in the ground.

They are usually the same price or slightly less, because the dog ear cut is made in production rather than on site. The saving with dog ear is time: a flat top fence needs the tops cut and capped straight after installation, which is slow work on a long run.

Mark 1 inch down each edge from the top corner and 1 inch in along the top, then cut the 45 degree corner off. A speed square and a circular saw does it. If you are cutting more than a handful, clamp a jig to the saw base so every picket comes out identical.