# Pig fence recommendations



## jjack010 (Apr 2, 2022)

I'm preparing to get pigs soon so planning out fencing.  I've thought about a pallet pen with hot wire on the bottom.  Recently I've been thinking about electric only (after training) so I can rotate pastures easily.  However, since we don't live on the farm I'm worried about them getting out.  We go to the farm about 2-3 times a week.  I do not have power at the farm so I would have to use a solar/battery energizer. 

I will be getting 3-5 pigs this first go round for growers to finish out.

So, pallet pen with hot wire, netting or a few hot strands?

What do you all think will work best for my situation?

Thanks!


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## Baymule (Apr 2, 2022)

Hot wire only will not work with pigs. They WILL run through it. A barrier fence plus hot wire will work. Pallets, strongly fastened together and T-posted in place would work along with a hot wire. 

Pigs will immediately turn over any water tub, so place a barrel outside the pen, run a pipe nipple into the pen with a hog nipple on the end. 

Feed can go in a bin feeder but it must be fastened securely to something or they will tear it loose and destroy it. 

I built a Pig Palace at the farm I just sold. Let me go look for that thread and I’ll be back to post a link for you.


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## Baymule (Apr 2, 2022)

https://www.backyardherds.com/threads/baymule’s-pigs-2018-herefords.37448/#post-539699


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## jjack010 (Apr 2, 2022)

@BaymuleThanks for the info.  Those are definitely my plans on the water and food.  My goal is to make it as low maintenance as possible.


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## Baymule (Apr 2, 2022)

I could even feed them without having to go in the pen. Much safer that way!


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## jjack010 (Apr 2, 2022)

Baymule said:


> I could even feed them without having to go in the pen. Much safer that way!


I saw that. Good idea. Great job on the pig palace.


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## Baymule (Apr 2, 2022)

Thanks! It sure made raising pigs much easier.


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## rbruno (Apr 6, 2022)

I went with combo fence panels for fencing.  They are more expensive but I was also worried about them getting out. I live in a rural area, but have neighbors right next door.  They were all interested in me getting pigs but I that would change if they got loose and were eating up their gardens. The combo panels are tall like cattle panels but have the smaller size openings like pig panels.  My pig pen boarders my horse field and didn't want he horses reaching over the shorter panels.  I think my pig pen build is on her somewhere as well.  I did steal some ideas from Baymule.   Feeding and water from outside the pen is a nice thing to have.


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## Hideaway Pines (Apr 6, 2022)

This is our first year with pigs as well. we picked them up a few weeks ago. They are in a smaller pen made of hog panels and T posts, then when we finished their pasture area (about 2.5 acres in all) which is made of stretched horse fencing with barbed wire up top with T posts with concreted corner wooden posts they will have three paddocks that they can be rotated through so we can start to grow some grass in each of them. We have not had any issues with them escaping but they sure gave it a good hard try for the first few weeks. Now they are happy to just enjoy their area. But the bigger they get the stronger they get, they could push over fencing that is not super strong. We took advice from @Baymule  for some of our design, we have not got the nipple watering system in yet, but I put their water in an old tire, now they cannot dump it, so for now that works well. We made them a house (we call it Hog Heaven) and when they were small we locked them up at night, but we are not doing that now. We live in deep woods with lots of predator's, so just wanted to be sure they would be safe. We also built this with other animals in mind, incase we wanted to get something else in the future - it could be use for other critters. We added guttering to the roof and directed it to the wallow we made out of clay, so they have a cool place when it gets hot, something we have to think about here in Texas. We also learned that pigs love wet food, and fermented food goes further and is better for their digestive system, so we feed them twice a day with a fermented wet mash... I know you are not there full time, so this will not work for you this time, but it might be something to consider in the future, it makes the food go twice as far, so costs less.


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## Baymule (Apr 6, 2022)

Thanks @rbruno !! Haha! I stole ideas from @Simpleterrier. He is my hog pen building hero! 

@Hideaway Pines that is one SUPER NICE hog pen! Happy hogs = good meat! Fermenting the feed not only makes it go farther, it also makes the meat taste better. Y’all are doing great!


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## Hideaway Pines (Apr 7, 2022)

Baymule said:


> Thanks @rbruno !! Haha! I stole ideas from @Simpleterrier. He is my hog pen building hero!
> 
> @Hideaway Pines that is one SUPER NICE hog pen! Happy hogs = good meat! Fermenting the feed not only makes it go farther, it also makes the meat taste better. Y’all are doing great!


thanks, I am ready for them to have the larger pasture, but we still have a ways to go before that is ready.


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## Animalsoverpeople (Apr 7, 2022)

jjack010 said:


> I'm preparing to get pigs soon so planning out fencing.  I've thought about a pallet pen with hot wire on the bottom.  Recently I've been thinking about electric only (after training) so I can rotate pastures easily.  However, since we don't live on the farm I'm worried about them getting out.  We go to the farm about 2-3 times a week.  I do not have power at the farm so I would have to use a solar/battery energizer.
> 
> I will be getting 3-5 pigs this first go round for growers to finish out.
> 
> ...


I got lucky with having chain link fence in my pig area. Mine are potbelly’s with strong snouts and can get out anywhere. I staked every foot at the bottom with 2” stakes and it has held great. I can’t do hot wires with my little kids or I would. I have used pallets for fencing and had good luck with some animals. The other main one I see in my area is 4”x4” square welded wire with hot at the bottom. Cost wise obviously pallets can be less expensive initially. But again mine are not full sized pigs.


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## Hideaway Pines (Apr 7, 2022)

Animalsoverpeople said:


> I got lucky with having chain link fence in my pig area. Mine are potbelly’s with strong snouts and can get out anywhere. I staked every foot at the bottom with 2” stakes and it has held great. I can’t do hot wires with my little kids or I would. I have used pallets for fencing and had good luck with some animals. The other main one I see in my area is 4”x4” square welded wire with hot at the bottom. Cost wise obviously pallets can be less expensive initially. But again mine are not full sized pigs.


one thought, we added downed trees/logs to the bottom of our cattle panel where it was not flush with the ground an attached them to the fence, this made it extra strong and heavy.  If you have any trees you can use for this it would be a good easy solution.


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## Simpleterrier (Apr 7, 2022)

Oh you can have hot wire with little kids it's good for them. My son was 4 and crawled under a fence got shocked in the forehead and just rubbed it and kept on going not even a look around. It was a good one I saw and heard the zap from about 100 ft away.

I know people who can touch electric fences and they can't feel it. I'm wondering if my son is that way


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## jjack010 (Apr 8, 2022)

Hideaway Pines said:


> This is our first year with pigs as well. we picked them up a few weeks ago. They are in a smaller pen made of hog panels and T posts, then when we finished their pasture area (about 2.5 acres in all) which is made of stretched horse fencing with barbed wire up top with T posts with concreted corner wooden posts they will have three paddocks that they can be rotated through so we can start to grow some grass in each of them. We have not had any issues with them escaping but they sure gave it a good hard try for the first few weeks. Now they are happy to just enjoy their area. But the bigger they get the stronger they get, they could push over fencing that is not super strong. We took advice from @Baymule  for some of our design, we have not got the nipple watering system in yet, but I put their water in an old tire, now they cannot dump it, so for now that works well. We made them a house (we call it Hog Heaven) and when they were small we locked them up at night, but we are not doing that now. We live in deep woods with lots of predator's, so just wanted to be sure they would be safe. We also built this with other animals in mind, incase we wanted to get something else in the future - it could be use for other critters. We added guttering to the roof and directed it to the wallow we made out of clay, so they have a cool place when it gets hot, something we have to think about here in Texas. We also learned that pigs love wet food, and fermented food goes further and is better for their digestive system, so we feed them twice a day with a fermented wet mash... I know you are not there full time, so this will not work for you this time, but it might be something to consider in the future, it makes the food go twice as far, so costs less.


Looks great and thanks for the info.  Did you bury your panels?


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## Hideaway Pines (Apr 8, 2022)

jjack010 said:


> Looks great and thanks for the info.  Did you bury your panels?


no, the panels are just at the top of the ground or slightly under depending on the variation in the area, but to be fair, we have lots large tree of roots in our area even though we are sugar sand, the roots are a deterrent to them getting out. But we will see how the horse fencing does, we may have to lay large logs in any areas we are concerned with.


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## jjack010 (Apr 8, 2022)

Hideaway Pines said:


> no, the panels are just at the top of the ground or slightly under depending on the variation in the area, but to be fair, we have lots large tree of roots in our area even though we are sugar sand, the roots are a deterrent to them getting out. But we will see how the horse fencing does, we may have to lay large logs in any areas we are concerned with.


Thanks for the info


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## jjack010 (Apr 8, 2022)

So I'm leaning towards woven wire exterior fencing and using electric to section off pastures.  I like the design towards the bottom of this article.  



			https://cefs.ncsu.edu/wp-content/uploads/designing-pasture-subdivisions-for-practical-management-of-hogs-2015.pdf?x47549
		


What are you all using for gates for multiple paddocks?  That seems to be where I'm hung up.  I understand if I use electric they won't want to cross it later so I'm confused as to what to use here.


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## Tjcib (May 24, 2022)

What breed of pigs are you getting?

Our American Guinea Hogs are perfectly content to stay within our Premier1 Electric netting. They are super smart so they will find a breach in the net, but if everything is secure and I don't have too much discharge from weeds, it keeps them in.

Obviously, a bigger breed will probably need more. But that's why I love AGHs...


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## jjack010 (May 24, 2022)

Hideaway Pines said:


> This is our first year with pigs as well. we picked them up a few weeks ago. They are in a smaller pen made of hog panels and T posts, then when we finished their pasture area (about 2.5 acres in all) which is made of stretched horse fencing with barbed wire up top with T posts with concreted corner wooden posts they will have three paddocks that they can be rotated through so we can start to grow some grass in each of them. We have not had any issues with them escaping but they sure gave it a good hard try for the first few weeks. Now they are happy to just enjoy their area. But the bigger they get the stronger they get, they could push over fencing that is not super strong. We took advice from @Baymule  for some of our design, we have not got the nipple watering system in yet, but I put their water in an old tire, now they cannot dump it, so for now that works well. We made them a house (we call it Hog Heaven) and when they were small we locked them up at night, but we are not doing that now. We live in deep woods with lots of predator's, so just wanted to be sure they would be safe. We also built this with other animals in mind, incase we wanted to get something else in the future - it could be use for other critters. We added guttering to the roof and directed it to the wallow we made out of clay, so they have a cool place when it gets hot, something we have to think about here in Texas. We also learned that pigs love wet food, and fermented food goes further and is better for their digestive system, so we feed them twice a day with a fermented wet mash... I know you are not there full time, so this will not work for you this time, but it might be something to consider in the future, it makes the food go twice as far, so costs less.


Thanks for sharing.  What size gates are you using?  Yeah, the fermenting won't work for my situation since I'm not on the farm daily.


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## Hideaway Pines (May 24, 2022)

We just finished the last of the three paddocks that our pigs will have access to. We will rotate them as needed to each one. We used woven wire and our pigs have not had any issues with getting out. My husband did do concreted wooden poles every third pole with T-posts for the rest, and this along with stretching the wire fence has kept them in no problem. We have the regular gates you get from farm stores, some are walk gate size others are the larger ones. Then we also have decided to use Hog panels for some areas where we will move the panel to close up one paddock and allow them access to another. Gates are so expensive we opted for this in several places. It is not as convenient, but for our set up it will work just fine. If we see we need a gate there instead, we can always add it. we cannot do electric since we are on sugar sand, not enough moisture to keep it hot, and trying to get water to the areas each day would be counter productive for us, so we went with permanent fencing.


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## jjack010 (May 24, 2022)

Ah, removable hog panels..........  great idea.  Thanks again for the info.


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## Hideaway Pines (May 24, 2022)

jjack010 said:


> Thanks for sharing.  What size gates are you using?  Yeah, the fermenting won't work for my situation since I'm not on the farm daily.


some gates are 6ft, some are 3 ft and we did put two 3 ft in one section to allow us to then back our stock trailer in, giving us the ability to attach each gate to the trailer to keep the pigs from escaping then we plan to feed them every day for a week or more in the trailer to get them comfortable with it... so we can load them easy when the time comes to take them to slaughter. They love hard boiled eggs, and will just about do anything for them, so this will be the way we get them to go in at first. at least that is our plan... stay tuned we will see how this plays out. also we added turkeys to our pig area now too. They pick through the pig poop eating anything the pigs did not digest, and all bugs as well, they forage like nobody's business and are super chill with them. It has been a great addition. Our hen is actually now laying eggs we will see if she will hatch them.


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