fencing

Z

zpurdy

New member
I'm starting to do prep work for a future food plot i plan on planting late next august and i see a problem. my family has cattle on our property and where i'm planting this food plot is accessible to the cattle as of right now. i need some way of keeping the cattle out of the food plot area but somehow let the deer come in and not be with the cattle. my dad just ordered a solar electric fence charger and he said that we could use this but then he also said that it would keep the deer out of the plot, this defeats the purpose of the food plot. will putting the electric fence lower not effect the deer if is was like 30" tall or so or should i just put the fence up and not use the fence charger. the other problem is that we need to keep the cattle in the fence right next to the food plot because they bust through the barbed wire fence and get out and thats sorta why he ordered the fence charger.

i'm open to any suggestions
 
I've never seen an electric fence stop a deer that was designed to stop cattle. Deer will jump the fence to get to the good food, sure it might shock them the first time but it will not take them long to figure out that it is there and how to get over it. Just run a single wire about waist level and it will stop the cows and the deer will still get in. We fence my father's fields this way every fall to winter the cows on and I still shoot a deer almost every year on those fields.
 
I have a 36" high barbed wire fence around my property where I whitetail hunt. That doesn't even stop the fawns.
 
Forget the electric fence, just put up a regular one......deer will find a way in, either under or over.

fence3.jpg
 
thanks guys, i'll be running the fence about waist high anyways and now my dad won't be out of $40 for the solar fence charger
 
Even a three-strand barbed wire fence will hold most cattle, with the top wire not much above waist high.

If the bottom wire is about knee-high, even a fairly big-horned buck can slide under faster than you'd believe. And adult deer very easily clear five feet or so, from standing flat-footed.

Art
 
I've noticed that elk don't dive under fences, they jump them. I saw a calf elk easily clear a 3' barbed wire fence this morning on my way to work.:)
 
You could put up a 5 foot high fence, and deer will easily jump or slide under! I watched one of the biggest bucks of my life get down on his knees and crawl across an opening near the road just to keep from being seen by the car coming down the road. This in July about 10 years ago. He probably died of old age because nobody ever dragged him out during deer season! I never saw him again, and only saw him by chance.
 
well i pretty much saw the answer to my own question the past few days when i went to the farm. i've seen 6 deer jump the waist high electric fence and chest high barb wire fence to get into our hay fields full of clover.
 
I fence with electric all the time but I could not imagine it stopping a deer. Normally I fence epee and don't see the electric doing much to stop it. Sharpen it and you could do some damage, even fatal, to the deer but you are likely to be trampled. Electric fencing sabres and foils would be completely useless. :p
 
You have to go about 10 ft high with sheep wire type fence to keep deer out , Just fence the cattle out and dont worry about the deer , they will get in there if there is anything they want , or even if the fence is just in their way .
 
A good friend lives in the souther tier of Ny and is a christmas tree farmer.

He put up a nice 8' fence around a field of xmas trees ( I can't remember what species the deer liked ) that the deer had been ravaging for a few years.


The adults still managed to clear the fence on a regular basis.
 
Multi-strand barbed wire or woven wire fense is way to much labor and expense to put up if your only objective is to keep out cattle. Electric is the way to go. Just keep the grass away from it or you could get a fire. Ditto for branches that could fall on it and press it to the ground.

E-wire is also a good way to keep cattle away from a feeder.

Best

S-
 
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