Has anyone had any experience with vinyl, three board horse fencing? I need to replace most of my fencing in my paddock and horse pasture. I have poor drainage in a lot of areas, and even locust posts eventually rot. I was hoping that the vinyl fencing would last just about for ever, unless it's not strong enough.
Thanks for any input!!
Rich
"What a long strange trip it's been."
Some of the vinyl fencing is vinyl covers over other posts. Pick strong posts. I have seen some large areas around here fenced with vinyl and it is holding cattle as well as horses.\
[img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] Pat [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]
"I'm not from your planet, monkey boy!"
Hi Rich!
I looked into vinyl fencing a year or two ago and once I saw the price, I looked for something else, Horse Guard Fence using PT posts.
In our climate vinyl can get pretty brittle due to extreme cold. We have been extremely happy with ElectroBraid rope on standard t-posts. It was easy to install, and the ElectroBraid is of very high quality. Our fence took a direct lightning hit a couple of weeks ago, and it took out the charger, but did not hurt the ElectroBraid at all. Unfortunately, it also blew through the breaker, traveled into the house, and took out quite a few things inside the house. We were bummed, but the fence was fine!
Rookie, There are ways of adding serious protection to your electric fence charger. It involves the installation of air wound coils (inductors) to impede the fast rise time pulse from the lightning as well as spark gaps to short out the components above the arc over potential of the gap. The addition of these components will not absolutely guarantee the survival of your charger or the prevention of propagation back through your house wiring... B U T... it will certainly lower your risk considerbly. It can protect you situations that otherwise may have smoked your charger and potentially caused mischief in your house (if on the same transformer.)
There are surge supressors that are to be installed at the breaker box to protect the whole house from surges coming in over your supply wires from the transformer. They are easy to wire to your breaker box. they are heavy duty MOV devices like the ones in spike supressor power strips but way larger... on steroids. A prudent move would be to add one on the load side of the breaker feeding the charger to absorb spikes that come into the box from the electric fence when there is nearby lightning.
These devices are available from the typical electrical supply houses where local electricians shop if not at the big box stores like Lowe's or Home Despot (uh... Depot)
[img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] Pat [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]
"I'm not from your planet, monkey boy!"
Rich, I dont know of any vinyl fencing I would use. I dont think its strong enough on the posts and for sure not on the rails. The rails usually just pops out when a horse leans on it.
One of the companies in our area started filling the posts with concrete but that makes it really expensive.
If you want a rail fence for horses I am not sure what your best option is but I like a good steel pipe fence with no climb on the inside or using no climb with "T" posts and good corner posts.
Mark
Today I drove a few hundred miles in southern and south central Oklahoma. I saw several places where horses and other stock were in patures and paddocks fenced with vinyl fencing which looked to be in perfect condition although I know for sure some of the fences are not nearly new. I suppose not all vinyl fencing is created equal... Don't drop your consideration of vinyl because there is at least one manufacturer or installer that contributed to a substandard fence. They can't all be bad or I wouldn't see so much of it standing and looking sooooooo goooood!
I intend to replae some of my barbed wire fence in front of the new house with white vinyl fencing and it will be to hold livestock as well as look good.
[img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] Pat [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]
"I'm not from your planet, monkey boy!"
Hi Pat,
I see it out there as well and maybe there is something out there that works. I just have never seen it. I do think that if you have a lot of area almost any barrier will work.
For me, its just not the right thing to do. There are ways to improve it but its not something I am comfortable with at this point.
Just because I am paranoid does not mean that my horse is not trying to get to the grass on the other side......... [img]/forums/images/icons/grin.gif[/img]
Regards,
Mark
Mark, The way I was told is that some animals can smell the ozone put off by the high voltage of a fence charger. Cattle and some other animals can spell it and learn to avoid the wire with the ozone smell. You can fool them for a short time with a non-electric fence (electric fence turned off like during a thunderstorm or whatever) but soon they will challenge the inactive fence.
Goats and horses (and some other animals) apparently do not smell the difference and once hit a few times (very few for most of them) won't approach the fence to see if it is on or off unless thay are conditioned to "TEST" fences. In general they avoid "testing" electric fences once they have learned which are hot.
A nice good looking vinyl fence with a single hot wire (with a substantial charger) on standoffs on the animal side (or both sides if animals present on both sides) should function very well and look good too.
Of course, you might not want to "train" horses to avoid fences if you want them to jump or for other special circumstances. I was at an all day beef producers symposium Saturday (sponsored by the Noble Foundation and held in Ardmore, OK) and was joined for lunch by the ranch manager of the Cooley Camp Ranch and a couple of his associates. The above observations were the topic of conversation while we ate our delicious steaks. The Cooley Camp Ranch has changed ownership over the years since it was founded at the end of the civil war and is currently about 11,000 acres. Most stock handling is done on horseback and they keep an extensive ramuda.
[img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] Pat [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]
"I'm not from your planet, monkey boy!"
Pat,
I looked the ranch up and it seems like they run a good operation. It is interesting to me that more and more big ranches allow hunting. Seems like a good way to bring in pretty easy money.
It’s nice to see some ranches still doing most of the cattle work on horseback. The reined cowhorse I bought last year came off a 14,000 acre ranch along the CA coast where they still do all the cattle work on horse back. It does my heart good to see larger blocks of land still around and the old ways being preserved. I also think it does the horse a world of good to be brought up that way. I think they tend to be really mature without being burned out or training sour.
I get out to OKC almost every year and I sure like that area. One of these years I am going to load up the truck and take 6 months to see that part of the country. I like the folks in that part of the country and there are little gems everywhere. Like the bombing memorial in OKC……it sure made an impact.
Regards,
Mark
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