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[Huggz]

Could you please make a stile (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stile) which allows only intelligent (two-legged?) creatures to pass through it, and is destroyable by building destroyers. It could either be built like grates or fortifications, whatever seems best. This would mean that you could have a proper farm with breedable animals and a butcher could get in without ALL OF THE ANIMALS ESCAPING... Also, the stile would preferably block pathfinding for creatures that couldn't pass over/through it.
Huggz

[Lord Darkstar]

Actually, you can ranch now. Just use chains.

Chained animals will get pregnant and breed. Chained animals can be collected by milkers or butchers. A milker will take the animal to a farm workshop and milk the animal. Any dwarf with Animal Care will grab an animal assigned to a chain and not in the chain, and take it back to the chain. So make them chained up next to your milking Farm Workshop so the milker won't play tug of war with the dwarves trying to put the animal back on the chain.

Stiles would be nice, but just having hoofed animals not able to pass over floor grates (cow gates) would do the trick as well.

[smjjames]

Also, the stile would preferably block pathfinding for creatures that couldn't pass over/through it.
Huggz

The real problem here are the pathfinding issues. In discussion on that future of the fort thread, Toady said that the biggest issue with something like this is pathing because pet impassible doors do stop pets, but the pets keep spamming the pathing, causing FPS drops.

Without a pathing rewrite, something like what you describe wouldn't work.

[Huggz]

Pathfinding is more of a bonus, but stiles would still be good even if they didn't block pathfinding. The problem with chains is that you have to assign newborns to the chains and whatever, whereas with a stile you could just leave them to it... I know it is unlikely for now, but it would be a cool feature.

[Hyndis]

Just allow zoning of an animal meeting zone. Add it into the regular activity zone, but make the animal meeting zone apply only to animals, separate from the regular meeting zone option. It would be possible to select both options from the activity zone menu if you wanted to which is how current meeting zones work. Or you can create two different meeting zone areas, one for dwarves and one for animals.

This would allow you to create a meeting zone for animals only, and so all animals would hang out in their own designated meeting zone instead of in your dining hall.

[Huggz]

Just allow zoning of an animal meeting zone. Add it into the regular activity zone, but make the animal meeting zone apply only to animals, separate from the regular meeting zone option. It would be possible to select both options from the activity zone menu if you wanted to which is how current meeting zones work. Or you can create two different meeting zone areas, one for dwarves and one for animals.

This would allow you to create a meeting zone for animals only, and so all animals would hang out in their own designated meeting zone instead of in your dining hall.

I prefer the idea of a stile but this would also be good.

[Azrael]

Just allow zoning of an animal meeting zone. Add it into the regular activity zone, but make the animal meeting zone apply only to animals, separate from the regular meeting zone option. It would be possible to select both options from the activity zone menu if you wanted to which is how current meeting zones work. Or you can create two different meeting zone areas, one for dwarves and one for animals.

This would allow you to create a meeting zone for animals only, and so all animals would hang out in their own designated meeting zone instead of in your dining hall.

Saying to animals 'hey can you hang around here please and not wonder off' generally doesn't work too well. A stile would be good, but pathfinding issues do need to be sorted.

[Roop]

Maybe allow assignment of pets to burrows?

[Hyndis]

Just allow zoning of an animal meeting zone. Add it into the regular activity zone, but make the animal meeting zone apply only to animals, separate from the regular meeting zone option. It would be possible to select both options from the activity zone menu if you wanted to which is how current meeting zones work. Or you can create two different meeting zone areas, one for dwarves and one for animals.

This would allow you to create a meeting zone for animals only, and so all animals would hang out in their own designated meeting zone instead of in your dining hall.

Saying to animals 'hey can you hang around here please and not wonder off' generally doesn't work too well. A stile would be good, but pathfinding issues do need to be sorted.

They already do that with meeting zones. This would just split off the meeting zone function of an activity zone into dwarven meeting zones and animal meeting zones. The behavior is already in the game, its just modifying it slightly.

Also this could be very beneficial for fortress planning with the way meeting zones work. For example, create an animal meeting zone just behind the guardhouse, so all intruders must pass through the animal meeting zone to reach the main dwarven meeting zone of your fortress. This means all of those stray dogs, wolves, lions, elephants, bears, and other creatures will hang out there providing a last ditch line of defense to your fortress, and any losses will quickly be replaced with reproduction.

Or create the animal meeting zone in a room surrounded by butcher and tanner workshops for a meat factory.

Animals already flock to meeting zones, so its just taking that current, existing behavior and just splitting the option, so that animals and dwarves don't always need to hang out in the same place.

Assigning animals to burrows will also work and do the same thing. Either way works! 

[Areyar]

Better if animals did not have clear, faraway and unseen destinations for pathfinding.
This is OK for modeling planned movement of dorfs, but instinctual movement is spurious:

Remove the deliberate pathing to meetingzones and cages/chained animals.
Let them meander about by generating random nearby destinations
maybe have them follow a nearby creature/dwarf, if herding, away from them if solist/shy.(?)

I suspect that this sort of behaviour is already modeled for wild animals.