A thought on electric fences, tell us your thoughts

[Starting late]

Someone suggested my dividing hot wire was too low for some big steers. Anyway, I have a VERY hot fence charger on some carefully watched hot wire. The charger is well grounded. When I bring calves home to wean I run the fence in my central paddock, which contains my corral for loading. When I bring the calves home I lock them into the corral only, with food and water and with about 4 of my best behaved older calves in the paddock which contains the corral. After about 10-24 hours when the weanlings settle down a bit, and get used to their "neighbors", I turn them out into the paddock. Before I turn them out I disconnect all of my hot wire except the central paddock. I have found that having some older calves with them in the paddock is a great benefit. The older calves already know the boundary and will actually nudge the weanlings away from the fence. Secondly that wire around just the paddock is VERY hot. Once my cattle are broke to the electric fence (2 day tops) I turn the fence off and leave it off about 80% of the time until I bring more home to wean. The only reason I leave it on 20% of the time is to keep any vegetation killed. After my cattle have experienced the wire one time, a year later you cannot get them to go through even and open gate without great hesitation on their part. The only way they go through is by following my "mule" as they all know it as a non-threatening food source.

 

[dun]

Our single starnd of hotwire is 28-32 inches off the ground. After the deer run though it a ocuple of times it will be only about 18 inches as it's hanging from ainsulotrs with a pretty good distance between and the gorund is hilly. The cows won;t cross it and I found out last week that the bull won;t either.
A thought on keeping the power off for long periods, JimGerrish discovered that if the fence is kept hot all the time, not just when it's needed, it cuts down on the damage from elk and deer to the fence. They learn to jump it rather then run through it.

 

[Bez+]

Someone suggested my dividing hot wire was too low for some big steers. Anyway, I have a VERY hot fence charger on some carefully watched hot wire. The charger is well grounded. When I bring calves home to wean I run the fence in my central paddock, which contains my corral for loading. When I bring the calves home I lock them into the corral only, with food and water and with about 4 of my best behaved older calves in the paddock which contains the corral. After about 10-24 hours when the weanlings settle down a bit, and get used to their "neighbors", I turn them out into the paddock. Before I turn them out I disconnect all of my hot wire except the central paddock. I have found that having some older calves with them in the paddock is a great benefit. The older calves already know the boundary and will actually nudge the weanlings away from the fence. Secondly that wire around just the paddock is VERY hot. Once my cattle are broke to the electric fence (2 day tops) I turn the fence off and leave it off about 80% of the time until I bring more home to wean. The only reason I leave it on 20% of the time is to keep any vegetation killed. After my cattle have experienced the wire one time, a year later you cannot get them to go through even and open gate without great hesitation on their part. The only way they go through is by following my "mule" as they all know it as a non-threatening food source.

Great stuff - cheap to operate so I leave them on if there are any catle near them.

To train cows, calves, whatever, hang some tin or aluminum pie plates from the fence with light wire.

Being curious critters they will go over to smell and lick the tin pie plates - well, they will a time or two - you now have trained animals!

We usually run family bets as to the first, secon and third animal to try the fence - country entertainment at its finest.

Cheers

Bez+

 

[mermill2]

I cross fence interior fields with 1 strand of high tensile.In some fields I raise the wire a little higher,so that the calves can pass under and creep to the other side.They won't venture far from momma.

 

[Jim62]

I tried that high wire to let the little calves go under one time. What that got me was a group of calves that absolutely can not be contained with any kind of fence. Once they learn to go under a fence, they never forget.

 

[dun]

Our calves will "forward graze" till they're about 2 weeks old. Apparantly the fun of getting zapped goes away because they don;t venture very near the fence after that.

 

[grannysoo]

We leave our fence hot all the time. It's cheap to run and I never want for them not to have the proper respect for it.

 

[Boldcat]

Last week it was dark and raining and I was running home when I ran into the hot wire that feeds all my fences. Completely forgot about it in my hurry. I hit it full speed and broke the connection with my neck and I don't know how it happened but the hot end wrapped around my neck and flattened me :shock: .I tryed to crawl away from it but I was disoriented in the dark and getting belted every second . I even took one in the mouth.Once I freed myself I laid there in the rain hurting all over.
I felt like my front teeth had been knocked out and I kinked my neck bad.
When I got home and told my wife what happened she laughed til she had tears in her eyes.

 

[pdfangus]

Last week it was dark and raining and I was running home when I ran into the hot wire that feeds all my fences. Completely forgot about it in my hurry. I hit it full speed and broke the connection with my neck and I don't know how it happened but the hot end wrapped around my neck and flattened me :shock: .I tryed to crawl away from it but I was disoriented in the dark and getting belted every second . I even took one in the mouth.Once I freed myself I laid there in the rain hurting all over.
I felt like my front teeth had been knocked out and I kinked my neck bad.
When I got home and told my wife what happened she laughed til she had tears in her eyes.

Boldcat, your story made me chuckle as well. Can't help but wonder what kind of canadian beer might have been involved in the pre story. Hit the wire with your neck......wondering if you are sorta short or if you are real tall and hit a wire designed to be overhead.

I put all overhead feeds 10 feet high and they are definitly out of my way.

 

[Fred Belknap]

Electric is the only fence that bulls will respect. My next door neighbor's bull and mine would tear up any fence we could build till we came up with high tension electric. They paw up a lot of dirt but don't touch the fence.
Fred

 

[pdfangus]

Does anyone know if electric fence will deter a black bear.

We reportedly have a huge male black bear in the neighborhood now. My home acerage has electric fence around 80 percent of it. entrance from the highway side is open but it is a good way off the road and fence might serve to funnel the critter in. It has worked well in that regard for cattle that have gotten out.

Mostly worried that he will find the feed in the barn and become a regular visitor and I don't want to walk up on him unexpectedly. so far no feed bins torn up.

 

[nap]

Last week it was dark and raining and I was running home when I ran into the hot wire that feeds all my fences. Completely forgot about it in my hurry. I hit it full speed and broke the connection with my neck and I don't know how it happened but the hot end wrapped around my neck and flattened me :shock: .I tryed to crawl away from it but I was disoriented in the dark and getting belted every second . I even took one in the mouth.Once I freed myself I laid there in the rain hurting all over.
I felt like my front teeth had been knocked out and I kinked my neck bad.
When I got home and told my wife what happened she laughed til she had tears in her eyes.

What a horror story. Sounds like the kind of thing that would happen to me including the response when I got home.

 

[Boldcat]

Pdfangus ,when I was a teenager I used to work at a honey farm in the summer and bears would often destroy an entire yard and we'd almost a full day putting it back together.
We used to trap them but by then the damage was already done. So about that time solar powered electric fencers came in and we wired all the yards and never ever had bear trouble again.

 

[pdfangus]

Pdfangus ,when I was a teenager I used to work at a honey farm in the summer and bears would often destroy an entire yard and we'd almost a full day putting it back together.
We used to trap them but by then the damage was already done. So about that time solar powered electric fencers came in and we wired all the yards and never ever had bear trouble again.

thanks for the information.

i figured that if it will keep the bulls in it ought to keep the bears out.

Bears are a relativley new recurrence in our part of the world. always used to have to go to the mountains to even think about a bear or the Great Dismal Swamp down in the southeastern part of the state.

Last few years young bears have been showing up in the city of Richmond, Va. We have had a lot of bear sightings in the last few years locally, but I have not seen one. this latest is supposed to be a big male.

One neighbor a few miles away says bear causes his cattle to run thru fence regularly.

 

[donnaIL]

We have a good charger and a good ground. My son in law (police officer) compares it to the charge of a taser. Our animal still from time to time find a way to escape. After reading this post maybe the wire needs to be lower, we keep it at a height that they can graze along the fence line and also so there isn't as much popping from shorting out on wet grass. I cannot remember how many miles our fence is rated for but even if it is shorting out it will shock you. The calves seem the most able to negotiate it, seems it is an animal preference rather than equipment issue. Just my opinion. donna

 

[Red Bull Breeder]

We got quite a few Black Bear around and have never had any problem with them causing the cows to run threw fences. I don't think any thing will make Elk jump a fence, unless its one they can't tear down.

 

[irish]

I have seen some of the farmers around here use chicken wire of all things. They have it up with the barb wire & it is electric. I saw a calf torn into pieces laying in the middle of the road beside this fence. I wonder how in hell that happened. I love electric fence. We used to dare our cousin to pee on it when we were little. If he did not do it we would tie him up to a tree out in the woods & leave him there. I think they even need to come out with shock collars for kids. That would be a hoot. My 2 yr old would have singed hair....that boy is wild.

 

[dcara]

I think they even need to come out with shock collars for kids. My 2 yr old would have singed hair....that boy is wild.

First, people have gone to jail for putting electronic collars on kids. Second, It is that attitude that is reponsible for screwing up more more retrievers than I can count. Electronic collars are a great tool for a trainer that understands the animal they are working, but they are a disaster in the hands of anyone that thinks they should be used for punishment. If allowed to be used on kids we would have a society of raving lunatics in no time. If you think your kid needs a collar now, I suggest you try learning something about child psycology and how to raise them, especially before they become teenagers.

 

[Jim62]

Lighten up !

The guy was making a funny........

 

[dcara]

Lighten up !

The guy was making a funny........

Your powers of clairvoyance exceed mine, and maybe he was. I'll admit it is a bit of a touchy subject with me, having seen animals tortured to the point of insanity because of "this will be a hoot", or "watch this" or, "I'll teach him", or "I'll just keep poping him 'till he gets it right" attitudes when coupled with electronic collars.