Post by thystledown on Jan 29, 2017 15:46:32 GMT -5
Reading about other fencing comments and I will agree that next to the highway I always run at least 2 strands of electric. I am running cows in low numbers on fairly large acreage. Where I have field fence/woven wire for goats and such like, I run a hot wire on top. In Texas I just used a single strand of barbed wire on top. The ground was too dry for good connectivity. And, in my personal experience, horses and cows will lean on and break down field fencing that doesn't have hot a hot or barbed strand above it to stop them. I do have a small pasture fenced that way but only put the goats and occasionally a cow with calf in it--and haven't had a problem. But another one I though I could get away with that but had all the horses and some of the beefers in there and they smashed the fence badly before I got a hot top strand run. I won't use high tensile on the farm at all because I have 7 horses that I sometimes want to put in other pastures. High tensile is like a cheese slicer for horses. Totally fine for cows--but you mentioned that you have horses too. Also, when running cows with a single strand electric with calves--you can NOT let the calves get under it. If you can't set it low enough to get the calves on the nose and really shock them, then don't do it. Calves that learn to disrespect fences will be horrid to fence as they grow up. And you can't just let it go until the weekend. The minute you see a calf is getting out you have to put it back and fix fence immediately. Sometimes I have to add a step in post between t-posts to adjust the wire height up or down over dips, rises or other irregularities in the ground. If you can't do that, you need to do a different style of fence. Also, running electric low enough to be effective on calves requires you to have sufficient moisture in the ground for good connectivity and if you have that, then you will have to trim under the fence line to prevent the grass from shorting it out. Electric is not low-maintenance. That said, for me, I can put in a lot of fence really fast which is great for temporarily fencing hayfields or, like me, you buy land that hasn't been fenced or used for 50 or 60 years and you want to graze it with out spending a fortune fencing it. I needed to fence 30+ acres last summer, so 2 strands of electric (next to a road) and one day of labor, and we were in. We plan to replace it with 32" tall 14.5 gauge field fencing (typically used for hogs I think), topped with two strands of electric. Then I can run goats or anything in there and not have to trim under it. Keeping weeds off electric is work I'd rather not do (and the kids start college next year!!!!). Also, I use 2 strand electric set higher for the horses and anything without calves on the really rough ground. We are in the foothills of the Adirondack Mountains so lots of land is pretty rough. Running field fence over that would be very difficult. Barbed wire, traditionally used here, is very expensive (closer post spacing and time consuming to install as well) and dangerous with my horses. There is a trade off in any kind of fencing.
