Solar electric fencing

[Hayhay]

On another thread a couple of you mentioned you have solar electric fencing and that it worked well.

Well....in order to accommodate the newest members of our extended family (2 pregnant highland cows!) we'll be needing some electric fencing.

Could you tell me what types/models/other info about your electric fencing, be it solar or not?

Thanks!

Hayley

[Heidi]

We have electric fencing, but I'd need to check what type, its not solar, but runs of a car battery, or you can plug it into mains. Regardless, I would really love to see a photo of the new cows! Are they short, but with lots of hair covering their face, like a fringe?
H

[dggoatlover]

I have a Gallagher unit running off a solar panel. Basically the solar panel is connected to a deep cell battery and the battery is connected to the unit. My new one is a lot bigger - does up to 10km - it will allow me to extend my fencing. I run five strands of turbo braided wire on star pickets. Works really well for us and keeps 17 goats contained in their paddocks. Before this one I had a smaller Daiken(?) model - fully self contained solar/battery unit that covered up to 2km of fence line.

The only time I have a problem is when the fence has a short and the girls can tell its not on! But when it is on they stay well away - most of them have been "bitten" a few times and are very wary.

If you check it regularly and keep the grass etc trimmed away from the wires it is fairly simple to manage. I find this works really well for the goats in that they won't rub or strain the wires like on a normal fence so minimises damage. The places in the yards etc where I have normal hinge joint wire etc set up I find I need to repair it constantly.

Wow! You are keeping busy! First sheep and paccies and now a couple of cows! Dinners at your place will be amazing!

[Hayhay]

Thanks for the info. Just when we think we're getting the hang of things we move on and need to learn more!

My husband was looking at a smaller solar unit which covers 2km (which is plenty seeing as our paddocks are all about 1 acre in size); but not having bought this before we weren't sure if it'd be a good buy or not - sounds like the older one you had Desley? I'll show him your post to help decide what we'll get.

There are pics of our cows on our blog (second post from top): http://quachclanjourney.wordpress.com/

Yep the cows are gorgeous. And some bad and some good happenings... We bought an old grey fergie which had a great engine and we thought would need just a bit of work on hydraulics and brakes. Turns out we were shafted - the hydraulics and brakes need completely re-building (the fella MUST have known) and will cost probably $1700 to fix. So because of this we had to reduce the number of cows we got from 3 to 2. Plus the chooks are sick and 3 have carked it in the last 2 days - the rest all on antibiotics.

Anyway, the woman we are buying the cows from is incredibly lovely, my husband explained the situation with the tractor and she replied with a 'no worries, take all three and just pay me when you can'. Sometimes the world throws you a bum-steer, but soon followed by an act of generosity.

So very excited we will be getting the three girls after all!

And very fast confirming that we're the sort of people who definitely DON'T just think about things!!! Next I've gotta research for the orchard....

[Glyn]

We have a Gallagher Sheep mains super 60. We brought it across from NZ and forgot we had it until the one on the place we bought died within two weeks of moving on. This one seems so much stronger and I see it is supposed to do 60 km of sheep fencing, I guess it has to be strong for all those woolies. Most of our internal fences are two wire electric and we're working on outriggers for all our external fences. Even with long wet grass and all those shorts it still packs a powerful punch.

Just looking at your web page - lovely place, and as you're looking for a name I was struck by your comment "loving the serenity". That was what we called our last farm, Serenity. Unfortunately its not applicable here though as we are just too close to the road and 'Sporadic Serenity' just doesn't seem to cut it somehow!

Just a thought, if you're doing electric fencing those plastic clip-ons for the pickets don't last long here - the skippies tend to knock them off and break them when they hit the fence at speed. We found twitching on a 3"to 4"piece of irrigation pipeing and threading through that holds better or if you're using wooden posts simply drill a hole in the post, then knock in a piece of irrigation pipeing and thread your electric wire through that.
Cheers ,Glyn.

[Hayhay]

Thanks for your info as well Glyn, and the tip for the roos - they're definitely around tho their favourite place is in the neighbours paddock across the road we've never actually seen them on our place - but I'm sure they do come through!

And I like your farm name suggestion - will definitely make a note of that thankyou. Hmmmm, 'sporadic serenity' doesn't quite have the same ring to it unfortunately for you now.

[Hayhay]

Well we've got a solar unit that will do up to 5km of fencing (way more than we need!). Will put it up in the morning; cows arrive about midday so will test it out!