Electric fence to keep wildlife out of garden

[jnapier]

Hello everyone,
I am putting an electric fence around my garden to help with the wildlife eating my veggies. Have a question about the fence charger. Any suggestions on which brand is a good one.

thanks

JIM

[Pat]

Curious what critters you are trying to keep out.

I'm not particularly brand loyal. I tend to buy on specs. You want a low impedance output and as many Joules of output energy as your budget permits. My latest charger is used on less than 1/4 mile of fence but is "supposedly" rated for 100 miles of fence. If you don't have a good ground system (multiple copper clad ground rods driven deep) then the best charger available commercially will not be very good. If your soil is dry, sandy, or both then you may need to run pairs of wires one hot and one ground) to get good performance.

I'm fencing in Angus cattle and they absolutely DO respect the fence, a single strand of wire about knee high or a little less.

Pat

[jnapier]

Hey Pat,
trying to grow a garden and keep out little hungry animals and deer. Don't mind sharing some, those raccoons will eat it all though. I have been doing some research on chargers, I understand the Joules, just wondering if there is a better brand that lasts longer, works better, has a better warranty, brand type I guess. Just don't want to buy junk. I have 110 power on a 200' run. I think 1.5 or better Joules will work. I have about 400 feet of fence around the garden. Most likely 5 strands wire, galvanized ground rods, black conductors. Any ideas on brands, setup, gate.

JIM

[jimmyj]

Gallagher seems to be an industry standard. I've used several and they all seem to be fine so I don't know if the extra couple of hundred $ for the Gallagher was worth it. That said, 8 years later it still works 24/7 x 365.

We use strands starting 8 inches above grade and slowly widening the spacing till we get to about 50 inches. Alternate "hot" and "ground" strands if you can. That said, rabbits and stuff will still go under it. If you go lower, you'll have to use roundup or elbow grease to keep the grass from touching the lower strands which is a pain. You can buy something called electric netting too which may be better for you.

Do some google searches on this and you'll get different ideas.

NOTE: If your garden plants touch the fence they will not be happy. Deer will jump right over it unless it angles out or is really high. It might be that a regular good old fence of woven wire is better for you.

[Pat]

I second the brand recommendation you got but there are plenty of other good ones available. It isn't like the technology is new or proprietary, it is well understood and the product is a commodity.

You will not be stopping rabbits with an electric fence unless you are very attentive to keeping all grass off the hot wires and mounting the hot wires (emphasis on plural) very low so as to create a nightmare for grass trimming especially at the Joule ratings you seem interested in which are way too low to prevent grass problems.

Similarly the deer can jump up to about an 8 ft height with no great difficulty. Lots of work constructing a fence that works acceptably well for little critters and deer. The best suggestion posted to date, IMHO, is woven wire but... I recommend woven wire at the level of the little critters with strands of wire above. Fence needs to be 8 ft high or say 6 ft with lateral component at top to discourage deer.

If you elect to use woven wire or similar at the bottom then consider folding a couple feet out horizontal at the bottom flat on the ground/grass. Digging animals will dig under a woven wire fence to get to your goodies but in general will dig right at the base of the barrier to their progress and will not back off over 2 feet and tunnel their way in.

Sorry if you are getting advice that conflicts with your initial intentions but you are getting the "real deal" not unsubstantiated whimsy from the guys here.

I have a neighbor who has a terrific garden every year and NO FENCE. One year he had a problem where he would ID a cantaloupe as ready to pick in the morning for breakfast but it would be entirely gone without a trace the next morning. This happened 3-4 times. He staked out the garden with his scoped rifle. He shot 3 dogs in the act of eating cantaloupe.

I shot a rabbit in my wife's lettuce and live trapped 6 raccoons (for deportation) in one garden season. Some years we have deer problems and some we don't and I have no real firm idea as to how to tell which will be which.

Pat

[jimmyj]

Ha ha

My dogs always ate my cantaloupe! I couldn't shoot them though, they're my buddies! [img]/forums/images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

There is a brand of fencing called "REDBRAND" that comes in a hinged form to fold out the bottom foot or two flat onto the ground or underneath.

Like Pat says, there are a million options.

All this said, the work devoted to keeping critters out might be less than growing 15% more produce and losing some! [img]/forums/images/icons/confused.gif[/img]

[Pat]

One of the hard parts could easily be limiting losses to 15% if no intentional protection is used.

Oh, and another thing...

In case I didn't make one thing perfectly clear... I think electric fence is NOT first choice for garden protection.

Pat

[jnapier]

I got the fence done in a workable fashion. I placed electric on the outside and chicken wire on the inside. So far so good, except one ground hog that chewed thru the chicken wire. I shot him eating my bush beans. Here is a photo of the garden fence. I also put in a picture of my ram pump that I made and installed. Works great and the garden is on gravity fed timers. Water when it needs it.