Electric fencing for a tractor?

[lanaschix]

Does anyone know of electric fencing wire that would work with a tractor that is moved every day? I have a battery operated electric door that runs off a small solar panel. Ideally I would like this hot wire to run off the same panel/battery. Also, does it need to be grounded and if so could that be easily moved daily? Thanks!!

After a year, we just had something dig under last night. The girls were safely locked upstairs. Luckily he could not get into the upper part so my chickens are safe but he'll be back. Ideas?

 

[dheltzel]

I agree with you about having wire on the bottom of the tractor. Good way to damage their feet and legs too when moving it.

I use an apron of 2x4 welded wire, 2 ft wide around to outside perimeter of my tractors. The wire is attached to the bottom boards all the way around, overlapping the corners as needed for full coverage. When I want to move it, I flip those apron to be vertical and use a rubber bungee to hold them up. Then I drag the whole tractor to the new location and drop the aprons back down. I'm extra cautious, and put board as weights on all the wire aprons. I also leave sharp prongs pointing out where I cut the wire. All to deter digging predators.

This year I hope to try narrower (3 ft) tractors for between the rows of vegetables. Aprons will not work here, so I intend to cut a piece of 2x4 wire to fit under the tractor (with a few inches protruding, maybe. Then make a second, identical piece to lay down in front of the tractor, so I can pull it onto the new piece, then go move the old piece for the next move. I can't say for sure that will wokr as expected, but I'm hopeful.

 

[dheltzel]

You must ground an electric fence or it won't shock anything. For large installations, they use the earth to conduct the current back to the fencer, but in very dry places that does not work well, so you will see them use a second wire a little lower as the ground. If anything touches both wires at once they get shocked. The trick is to place the 2 wires so that any predator will touch them both at the same time.

You might look into the electrified mesh fences made to contain chickens. Premier and Kencove are brand I recall seeing.

 

[can you hear me now?]

My easier suggestion would be to put a bottom piece of hardware cloth on your chicken tractor. that would keep them from digging in and allow your birds to still get grass when your tractor is moved.

 

[lanaschix]

I'm going to look into that electric mesh. I have several reservations about putting wire on the bottom. Our ground is pretty uneven and I think it's going to make the tractor hard to move.also, the chickens love scratching around and making holes and they won't be able to do that. Of course the plus side is that we won't have so many holes in our yard since we. move the tractor every day.

 

[blucoondawg]

You do need a ground for an electric fencer however for something like this you would only need a very small fencer just to cover the perimeter of a tractor and your ground wouldn't have to be much providing you have decent soil not super dry sandy soil

 

[lanaschix]

How deep do you think the ground would need to go? We have sandier soil but wet a lot (Florida.) Is it something I could pretty easily pull out and move daily?

 

[blucoondawg]

I'm no expert but I have been doing a lot of reading on electric fences, one of the places recommended 1 ground rod per Joule of fencer power, I have a 2 Joule charger that is supposed to handle 50 miles of fence and I only pushed my rod in until I hit a rock at about 3 feet and my tester shows my fencer is producing max charge so I would think you could make up a rod you can step in as far as you can and pull out to move, you could even use 2 short ones just make sure they're spaced 6 feet or so.

If for some reason that didn't work you could get around that by running 2 wires close to each other around the tractor so that the predator encounters both wires, one hooked hot the other ground. Your ground does not necessarily have to be in the ground. You could also lay down a perimeter of chicken wire and ground to that so the predator steps on it then encounters the hot wire. There are plenty of ways to get around ground rods for small applications like yours

 

[slingshotandLAR]

It can be done....

Mount the charger to side of the tractor, then make brackets and install a wire around the tractor, I think 12-16 inches would be good. Mount the insulators to said brackets and install wire.

Now, mount a small coated copper stake to the front side of the tractor opposite the wheels, make sure it's 8-12 inches long and leave as much as possible sticking out the bottom. Use a standard pipe bracket to hold it in place. Run the ground wire from the charger to that stake.

Now when you move the tractor all you have to do is step the stake down when you set the tractor down and its grounded.

Completely portable electrified system attached to the tractor.

 

[lanaschix]

That is just what I'm looking for. Of course I'm a total newbie to Electric fencing so I'll probably have to Google all those terms.