Farm Fencing

[CPT Bluegrass]

So my wife and I are purchasing a small acreage and want to get started with animals. We want to use 3/4 acre for farming, an acre for mini cattle, and an acre for sheep & chickens. My question is, what type of fencing would be best as I want to do a crop rotation so that my animals get new scenery every season and I'm able to move my area around that I farm so that its not as hard on the land. Thanks for your input!

 

[patandchickens]

Hi, welcome to the forum

As far as the chickens, be aware that unless you have them in a small moveable roofed pen (chicken tractor), which you cannot keep *many* chickens that way unless they are broilers just being grown up for slaughter in a couple months, you are not exactly going to be able to fence chickens. They will more or less go where they want, *if* they want. Although if they're happy with the pickin's in the area around the coop they may not choose to trespass. Free range chickens will always be vulnerable to hawks, there is just not a whole lot you can do about that.

Chickens and sheep are both major dog-and-coyote predator magnets. So from your plans, it sounds to me like your best bet to start out with would be to fence in the entire perimeter of your property (perhaps not your actual house and lawn; or perhaps you DO want to include them in the perimeter fence) using something that is fairly dog-and-coyote-proof.

Plain old field fencing is not necessarily all that effective in this regard, because of the size of the holes and the ease with which predators can go under or even over it. It would be safer, if a bit more expensive, to use something with smaller holes, especially if you are in an area with houses that may have smaller dogs -- like 6x6 or 4x4 holes, usually called 'small stock fencing' or seomthing like that, talk with the guys at your farm store.

And then you would want to add AT LEAST a strand of hotwire (electric wire) on the top. Ideally you would also run a low-down strand of hotwire on the outside, or a strand of barbwire just an inch or so above the ground, to discourage digging under the fence (which is how nearly all coyotes, and a whole lot of dogs, would try to get your sheep etc). However you have to consider what animals are on the other side of the fence -- if your neighbor has horses you would for sure not want that barbwire there -- and whether there are likely to be *people* on the other side -- in a residential area I would not use a low hotwire -- and furthermore a low hotwire will ONLY work if you commit to keeping the weeds trimmed very low underneath it so it doesn't short the electric fence out. If you will be running cattle or sheep right against the perimeter fence you may also want a standoff hotwire at sheep shoulder height, to keep the animals from pushing/rubbing at the fence.

Then you can use less-serious crossfencing to establish paddocks within that perimeter-fenced area. There are a lot of different options depending on how permanent vs moveable you want the crossfencing to be. Most of the more-economical and more-moveable options are different versions of electric fencing (some good permanent options are electric too), so it would be worth taking a crash course in electric fence design/installation/maintenance -- www.premier1supplies.com produces very good products but the real reason I am sending you to their website is that they have excellent educational materials there, just do a buncha reading and you will get a better sense of your options and constraints.

Good luck, have fun,

Pat

 

[DonnaBelle]

I ditto Pat about the electric fencing. We have electric poultry fencing, three 135 ft. sections together to make a huge fenced in area. The reason it is so large is because there is a huge wild plum thicket at one end of the chicken yard. We let wild ragweed grow up in the chicken yard so they are "under cover" at all times. Also, have a rooster, they guard the hens and pretty much keep them in line.

We have about 40 chickens and have never lost one yet inside the yard. We had some banties that insisted on flying over the fence to the outside world. The hawks got them.

We also have high tensile wire around the goat pasture. 2 strands and so far the goats (Nubians) have not offered to go through it. I think my husband said he has 6,000 volts going through the wire and they won't get any closer than 3 feet to it.

We also use it for horses, works for them too. Good luck with your animals. We sure do enjoy ours. Plus it's sure nice to have fresh eggs and goat milk.

DonnaBelle