North Florida eats wood fences. We build for that.
Decay, termites and storm wind, all in the same back yard. Wood posts
move under that. Steel doesn't. So every fence we build stands on
galvanized steel posts, hangs on welded steel gate frames, and is set for
the soil on your side of town. We won't be your cheapest quote. Seventy
three people have rated us 5.0 anyway.
This is the whole argument, and you can check every part of it
against anyone else's quote.
01
Steel posts, not wooden ones
The posts are galvanized steel and they sit behind the boards, so it still looks like a wood fence from both sides. Wood posts twist and warp as they dry out. That is what makes a fence line go wavy. Steel does not move.
02
The gates are welded steel
Gates fail first, because they are the only part that moves. A wooden gate frame slowly pulls out of square and starts to drag. A welded steel frame cannot, so it still latches years later.
03
The boards are stained before they are built
Stained at the factory, so every face and every cut end is covered before anything is nailed together. Water soaks into the end of a board about a hundred times faster than the side, and once a fence is up you can never reach those ends again.
04
Built for the ground you actually have
Tallahassee changes soil halfway across town. North of the Cody Escarpment is clay bearing loam. South is loose sand that drains fast and needs a deeper hole and a wider footing to hold the same post. We dig for the yard we are standing in.
05
You get the specification in writing
Materials by name, fastener type and grade, post spacing, concrete per post, gate locations, and photos of the style. You can hand our quote and anyone else’s to a third party and have them tell you which fence is actually better.
06
A date we can actually keep
We schedule five days for a three day job, which is why we are booking five to six weeks out. We could book two weeks out and turn up whenever. We would rather give you a real date and be there on it.
01 / The climate
The number nobody quoting you will mention
The USDA Forest Products Laboratory publishes a decay hazard index for
every city in the country. It measures how fast untreated wood breaks
down outdoors. Anything above 65 is considered severe.
65 · severe
Tallahassee, FL93.6
Atlanta, GA70.7
Washington, DC58.2
Chicago, IL50.4
Denver, CO36.3
Los Angeles, CA9.1
Scheffer Climate Index, USDA Forest Products Laboratory, Table 1 of
GTR‑179, from 1971 to 2000 climate normals. The higher the number,
the faster untreated wood breaks down outdoors, and anything above 65 is
classed as severe. Cities chosen to span different American climates.
Most of the Gulf coast sits in the severe band with us.
And decay is only the first of three
Termites. The building code classifies all of
Florida as a “Very Heavy” termite zone. That's the highest
of four categories, and there isn't a county in the state that
escapes it.
Storm wind. Tallahassee's adopted basic wind speed is
120 mph, 3 second gust, under the 2023 Florida Building Code. A six
foot solid fence is a sail. Everything it catches goes into the posts.
Any one of those you can design around. All three at once is why a
fence specified for a national market is not specified for this one.
The materials that are fine in Denver or Los Angeles are the same
materials, sold into a climate that treats them very differently.
02 / Straight answer
So does a wood fence just rot away here?
No, and we are not going to tell you it does. What actually goes wrong
is quieter than that, and it is the reason fences here start looking
tired years before they fall down.
The decay index and the termite zone are why the material
has to be chosen carefully. Properly treated, ground contact rated
pine handles both. Under-specify it and you have a problem. Specify it
properly and you do not.
Pressure treated pine that's properly rated for ground contact is not
going to rot out in five years. That's a myth. A ten year ground
contact study in Gainesville scored treated southern pine 9.7 out of
10 for resistance to decay and termite attack.
What actually happens is the post moves. Treated southern yellow pine
warps, twists, checks and splits as it dries. Read any treated lumber
warranty and you'll find warping, twisting, checking and splitting are
specifically excluded from coverage. So the post is still
“good” by the warranty's definition while your gate drags
on the ground and your fence line has gone wavy.
Steel doesn't move. That's the argument. It isn't more complicated
than that.
What that's worth, in plain terms
A steel post outlives the boards on it. When the pickets and rails
eventually weather, you replace pickets and rails and the posts stay
in the ground. You are buying the expensive part once.
The part most people actually notice is simpler. A fence on posts that
have not moved still reads as straight from the curb. Ours are built
so that in a few years they still look like they went in recently,
rather than leaning, bowing and pulling away from the gate.
Board on board with a scalloped top line, black post caps, under live oaks. Tallahassee.
03 / Steel post vs 4x4
The same fence, on two different posts
A comparison of materials, not of companies. Both columns are
published figures you can check.
Galvanized steel post
Doesn't rot, twist, warp or crack. It's steel.
8.0 ft post spacing at every wind speed in the manufacturer's published table, from 70 mph through 110 mph.
Installs behind the pickets, so the fence reads as wood from both sides.
Limited lifetime warranty to the original residential purchaser. Replacement material, not labor, and coastal environments are excluded.
When the pickets weather out, you replace pickets and rails. The posts stay.
4x4 southern yellow pine
Warps, twists, checks and splits as it dries. That isn't a defect, it's what the material does.
Spacing drops to 4.5 ft at 110 mph to carry the same six foot fence. Almost twice as many posts.
Every treated lumber warranty in the industry specifically excludes warping, twisting, checking and splitting.
UC4A is the general use rating and the usual big box stock. UC4B is the heavy duty rating, and it is rarely what's on the rack.
When the post moves, the fence line moves with it.
ASCE 7-05, Exposure B. Tallahassee's adopted basic wind speed is 120
mph, 3 second gust, under the 2023 Florida Building Code.
Maximum post spacing, 6 ft solid fence
70 mph
90 mph
100 mph
110 mph
Galvanized steel post
8.0 ft
8.0 ft
8.0 ft
8.0 ft
4x4 southern yellow pine
8.0 ft
6.7 ft
5.5 ft
4.5 ft
At the wind speeds this city actually designs for, a wood post fence
needs its posts almost twice as close together to do the same job.
Most of them aren't built that way.
Post embedment and footing, drawn to scale. Scroll sideways on a phone.
The same thing, built. Rails bolted through to the steel, and the gate frame hung on the same post.
04 / What we specify
Three decisions, made the same way every time
Galvanized steel posts.
They install behind the pickets, so from either side you still see a
wood fence. They don't rot, twist, warp or crack, and they carry a
limited lifetime warranty from the manufacturer. When the pickets and
rails eventually need replacing, you replace pickets and rails. The
posts stay.
Welded steel gate frames.
Sixteen gauge, powder coated black. A wood gate frame sags. It's what
wood does. A welded steel frame doesn't, so the gate still latches the
way it did the day we hung it.
Pre-stained pickets.
Stained at the factory before assembly, which means every face and
every end gets coverage. Water enters end grain about a hundred times
faster than it enters the sides of a board, and end grain is exactly
what you can't reach once a fence is built.
Steel posts, behind the pickets.Welded steel gate frames.Commercial grade hardware.
He was quick to point out that he would be on site and doing the job himself with his team. I think that is what closed the deal for me. Having the owner of the company doing the work brings the process to a whole new level and you can see it in the craft.
Jason D.
On price
They will not be the cheapest fence company, but I truly believe you get what you pay for.
Desiree K.
The finished work
The lines are clean, the alignment is precise, and the overall craftsmanship truly stands out. You can tell this fence was constructed to last.
Kyle R.
Planning the line
You can tell he knows what he’s doing by how he planned it out and made suggestions about where to put the fence and how to get around trees.
Zachary J.
Repeat work
We keep going back to Ray because we know he is a true professional who asks us what we want, gives us the options, adds his own thoughts and then creates a solid masterpiece, every time, all in the time frame that he promises us.
David H.
Turning up at all
I had tried for a couple of years to find somebody who would respond to my request for building a fence. Nobody wanted to follow through.
Joy S.
Replacing a fence that gave out
Ray just finished replacing my 14 year old fence and did an amazing job. He was on time, on budget and less expensive than the competition.
John H.
Getting called back at all
I was disappointed with the 4 other fence company’s I called. When I called manta ray fencing he took care of my fence needs right away without hesitation … he’s the best fencing contractor around Crawfordville and Tallahassee.
Worth saying out loud before you spend an afternoon on estimates.
We're probably right for you if
You're staying in the house, and you'd rather buy the fence once.
You want the material list, the fastener type, the post spacing and the concrete per post written down before you agree to anything.
You can wait five or six weeks for a date we'll actually keep.
You care what's in the ground, not just what the fence looks like on the day it's finished.
You've had a fence go wavy before and you don't want to do it twice.
We're probably not, if
The lowest bid is what decides it. There are people here who'll do it cheaper, and that's a real option.
You need it up next week.
You want the cheapest thing that clears a survey before a sale.
You'd rather not talk through soil, spacing and post depth. We're going to bring it up.
None of that is a judgment. It's just a different job than the one we're set up to do well.
07 / Questions
The things people actually ask
Why do wood fences here start leaning after a few years?
Because the post moves, not because it rots. Treated southern yellow pine warps, twists, checks and splits as it dries out, and once the post has moved the whole fence line follows it.
Read any treated lumber warranty and you will find warping, twisting, checking and splitting are specifically excluded from coverage. So the post can be entirely fine by the warranty’s definition while your gate drags and your fence line has gone wavy.
Does pressure treated wood really rot out in five years?
No. That is a myth and the field data does not support it. A ten year ground contact study in Gainesville scored treated southern pine 9.7 out of 10 for resistance to decay and termite attack.
We would rather tell you that than sell you something on a claim that is not true. The argument for steel is movement, not rot.
What makes Tallahassee harder on a fence than most places?
Two things, both measurable. The USDA Forest Products Laboratory puts Tallahassee’s decay hazard index at 93.6, one of the highest in the continental United States, where anything above 65 is already considered severe.
On top of that, the building code classifies all of Florida as a “Very Heavy” termite zone. That is the highest of four categories, and there is not a county in the state that escapes it.
How far apart should fence posts be?
It depends on the post. For a six foot solid fence, the manufacturer’s published data puts a galvanized steel post at 8.0 ft spacing all the way through 110 mph. A 4x4 southern yellow pine post drops to 4.5 ft at that same speed.
Tallahassee’s adopted basic wind speed is 120 mph, 3 second gust, under the 2023 Florida Building Code. At the speeds this city actually designs for, a wood post fence needs its posts almost twice as close together to do the same job.
Why does my gate sag when the rest of the fence is fine?
A wood gate frame is a rectangle held together at the corners, hung off one edge and swung several thousand times a year. Over time the corners work loose and the rectangle becomes a parallelogram. That is the sag.
It is not bad building, it is geometry plus weather. We build gate frames from 16 gauge welded steel, powder coated black, so the frame cannot rack in the first place.
What is UC4A and UC4B, and why should I care?
They are the two ground contact ratings for treated lumber. UC4A is the general use rating and it is what covers fence posts. UC4B is the heavy duty rating, specified for severe decay environments and for members that are difficult to replace.
In a city with a 93.6 decay index, UC4B is the defensible specification. It is also rarely what is sitting on the rack at a big box store, which is worth knowing when you are comparing two quotes that look the same on paper.
Why are you booking five to six weeks out?
Because we schedule five days for a three day job. We would rather have the room and not need it than promise you a date we cannot keep.
We could book two weeks out, take your deposit, and then turn up whenever. We would rather give you a date that is real and then be there on it.
Do you set posts in concrete?
Yes, and the concrete is crowned, sloped so water sheds away from the post rather than pooling against it. That is the documented best practice, despite what you will read in contractor forums.
Depth and footing width vary by where you are in town. Tallahassee is split by the Cody Escarpment: north of it you are in Orangeburg fine sandy loam, and south of it you are into Ortega and Kershaw sands, which are loose and drain fast. Loose sand needs deeper embedment and a wider footing to develop the same resistance.
A capped board on board run, black post caps stepping away. Leon County.
Leon, Wakulla, Gadsden and Jefferson look like one market on a map.
In the ground they are not. USDA rates every acre of Leon County
Moderate or High for corrosion of concrete, and not one acre Low.
We published the numbers for all four counties, including how to pull
the rating for your own address out of the same federal database.
