Determination of Electric Fence Voltage

GA Lyn. You it hit the nail on the head on this one. I started off with an electric fence, but ended up going to 11 feet tall, all the way around my garden.

And as far as using a '60s era fence charger, your better off keeping it as a novelty and investing in a solar powered fence system, they're self contained, no external power source and will energize 1 mile of fence line. I've had mine for 11 years now and the only thing I've had to do was to replace the battery once so far.

probably nice piece of free meal.

Yeah some kind of good deer steak and a mug beer.

Thanks for the great advice on this!

I agree - electric won't work.

I have a 4ft fence (keeps the smaller critters out) and then two strands of plastic caution tape...like crime scene tape...loosely tied at 5ft and 6ft. It moves enough to deter them from jumping the fence. I remove the tape at the end of the season and they jump right in and clean up the remains saving me some work!

If you put in a permanent electric fence unit you will need to ensure that the earthing of it is good. Drive a a stake specifically for it and ensure that this earth electode is further than 10m away from any other earth electrode.

Modern electric fences are rated in Joules and a mains unit will run many kilometers of fencing.

The insulating effect of hooves is the same for all livestock: even humans wearing rubber soled shoes will get a good shock - experience.

Excellent advice and a clever tip - have another GA

Hi Guys,

When I was a young boy (and very stupid) I pissed on one of those fences.

I learned very fast.

Later in my life my wife and I raised goats and we learned the hard way that goats are very hard to control.

But one duck (we also raised ducks) got zapped on the lower wire and flipped upside down; but it's legs were still walking. It survived. Until we ate it.

Those mechanical fencer put out about 7 KV.

When I found out that 7 KV was not enuff for the goats. I built a fencer from an ignition coil (25KV) and that was still not enuff to keep the goats out.

But it sure felt like a 12 Lb. sledgehammer hitting my arm when it jumped my screwdriver.

I still had not learned to stay away from HV.

TTYL Jens

I have had my experience with goats.NEVER try to out-stubborn a goat.I had one I called Houdini,cause he could get out of anything.Not only that, he showed the cows how to get out.And the horses.He would wait for a rain, then sniff the fence for ozone, and if it was grounded out, like it usually was after a storm, out he would go to the soybean field and wreak havoc.I learned that you never beat a goat, you eat a goat.Roasted slowly over charcoal.3 months after gelding him, to reduce the strong smell.Not as good as deer, but not to bad with Tabasco and BBQ sauce.I had to eat the whole thing myself, because my wife and kids would not touch it.It took 3 days,and by the time I took the last bite, I was glad to be finished.(Although I did have a hard time keeping it down, I was determined to win this final round and I did.)

Love that story

I had a horse who became addicted to "cribbing", chewing on wood fence rails and using them to burp (it's from boredom). To keep from having to replace fence boards all the time, we electrified them. Only after doing that did we realize that we were losing a lot of feed (alphalpha) to deer, because once the fence went hot, the deer stopped coming in at night and our feed lasted longer. It wasn't that high, maybe only 5ft. But it was white, so maybe once the deer learned that the white fence hurt, they stayed away.

As an adjunct to any fence I found a chemical repellent that works well. Nothing beats the high fence, but sometimes you have plants that aren't in the garden area that you still want to protect. The product is called, "Deer Out." It is mixed and sprayed on the leaves of the plant to be protected and can last up to 3 months, even with rains. I have no affiliation with the product or company, except as a satisfied customer. You will have a slight, but tolerable odor to put up with, but it beats the heck out of discovering a stripped plant that had all it's leaves the day before. And like all products, for whatever reason, some people don't have the same experience as I have had.