Electric fence

[JackE]

I have 600' of the electrified poultry netting from Premier, powered by household current/ The electric draw is like a small watt lightbulb, hardly noticeable.
Jack

 

[galanie]

If the chickens touch the wire, are they ok?

Depends what type of charger. The strong one for cattle put out a charge that will hurt them. But since that one is outside the fence anyway, then no problem.

 

[centrarchid]

Some of my birds get shocked routinely when they get out of pens. When a rooster attempts to fight another in pen the wire is so placed that bird on outside must contact wire to launch an attack. With my level of charge the feathers do not conduct well but legs, bill and display tissues (comb and wattles) on head do. Birds clearly jump when zapped but it does not affect them as strongly as does a mammal. Birds will attempt to avoid zapping but will tolerate it when aggressive or when they see good eats on other side. As a kid we confined cattle, hogs, sheep and even horses with hot wire. The young hogs (piglets) required positioning of hotwire that obstructed chickens. Even with higher voltage of that system birds would tolerate zaps. To my knowledge we never had real injury caused by zapping. A horse got cut up on fencing because it panicked but that was not directly to the zapping.

 

[galanie]

I use Premier's electric netting and yes, they can tolerate that if they really want to, like you say. As I understand it, it's a lower, pulsing charge rather than a brush popper or whatever they call the high power ones used for cattle. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[sn0wwhite]

Thanks centrarchid and gelanie, I appreciate the information. I live on a cliff and I'd like to not fence the top of the retaining wall, but still have some sort of protection for both the hens not jumping off and disssuade foxes and raccoons from coming up.

I don't think I can prevent either 100% but I'm trying to decide if I should just leave it open (there is a row of lilac bushes in front of the drop which is only about 5 feet down to a steep hill), put a one foot decorative border kind of fence on the edge just to make it that much higher of a drop or run a low line of electric wire on the edge.

 

[jamie7100]

Many of the fencers purchased at farm stores are rather weak. You do need a strong one for the netting because the weeds/grass draw power from the fence. We bought one from premier that is stronger than the one my dad was using with this beef cattle and it does give a good zap. Both send out pulses with slight delays. They will get shocked and let out a big squawk but won't be permanently harmed by the fence. When the fence is first set up, it is a good idea to monitor the birds because there is a chance they can get caught in the netting if they are not fully grown. If they are continuously shocked before they are untangled, that could kill them. Farmers often get away with a weaker fencer because they are usually only powering one strand that doesn't have any contact with weeds or grass because its a couple feet from the ground. The nets have their lowest hot wire within inches of the ground and have multiple strands.

 

[FenikT]

Personally, I'd recommend a 12V model over any 6V, especially when dealing w/ (wet) weeds or grass touching the popper wire. The model I went w/ was a Vanguard Red Snap'R (which can use either 6 or 12V dry/wet cell batteries). You can hook up a solar trickle charger to maintain top performance.

In my particular situation, I have a 6ft tall open top run which has a 7ft privacy fence as one of its walls. Because the coons were more likely to enter from the neighboring yard on top of the fence line, I wound up stringing wire tape along the top of the fence (where they gingerly balance & walk) and along the top of the run's wood frame. I grounded the chicken wire walls of run to the ground post(s), as well as wrapped a strand of heavy gauge copper (attached to the grounding post) around the adjoining tree limb (which provides vertical access to the middle of the run).

Without a ground connection, coons (or any other climber) can walk atop the "hot" wire w/out issue. Once they touch a grounded connection (chicken wire wall or copper wrapped limb) while perched on the hot wire, all hell breaks loose. Poor Mr. Coon launched about 2ft in the air when he completed the circuit from atop the fence while reaching for his climb down limb.

 

[sn0wwhite]

This is all great information. I'm a month or two away from installation, but probably something I'll use!