Fences and more for Free: The Wattle-Fence-Club

[Sally PB]

I have a way to use up all the bramble bushes I'll be cutting down this spring. Talk about a FENCE. Some of the thorns on those things....

Thanks for the idea!

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

I am so impressed and inspired. I have an endless supply of twig material here. Question about the posts. Are the end posts buried in the ground? Are the other posts buried? If I wanted to do a fairly long fence, how often should I be burying a post?
Now I really wish the snow would disappear but nothing stopping me from collecting materials.

Those end posts are simple 2x2's that i have just rammed into the ground with a fence-post-driver, maybe 60cm deep (2'). The five posts in between are some almost straight branches that i just hammered into the ground with a mallet and the vertical branches between those are just woven in.
If you need a long fence, i would hammer a 2x2 or an equally strong branch or stem every 2-3m (6-9') into the ground and put a smaller branches between, depending on the length of your twig material. Remember you need at least three vertical studs to keep a branch/twig horizontally in the fence.

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

I have a way to use up all the bramble bushes I'll be cutting down this spring. Talk about a FENCE. Some of the thorns on those things....

Thanks for the idea!

I thought about using the vines of the wild roses that are going rampant on my land, but that's just cruel to the ducks. I also have a lot of hawthorn…
Just wear thick leather gloves when you work with that stuff, i poked my right thumb on Sunday and it is throbbing today.
I assume a 6' tall woven perimeter fence, overgrown with wild roses should keep most predators out.

 

[Sally PB]

Just wear thick leather gloves when you work with that stuff, i poked my right thumb on Sunday and it is throbbing today.

Oh yeah. Many years ago, I was pulling up some weeds, and was focused on the ground. I didn't even see a hawthorn thorn and it hit my left eyeglass lens. Had I not worn glasses, I could have severely damaged my eye.

I think about that when they run the lasik vision correction ads. Nah... just gonna keep wearing glasses.

 

[AmeliaBedelia]

This is so cool! And the end result is pretty, unlike chicken wire.

It reminds me of a "living fence" tutorial I saw on youtube...except this seems more doable for me. But similar cottage/whimsical look.

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

Oh yeah. Many years ago, I was pulling up some weeds, and was focused on the ground. I didn't even see a hawthorn thorn and it hit my left eyeglass lens. Had I not worn glasses, I could have severely damaged my eye.

I think about that when they run the lasik vision correction ads. Nah... just gonna keep wearing glasses.

I am wearing glasses too, but i will buy a good eye protection that goes over my glasses. Last time when i was out cutting twigs, a rose-vine pulled the glasses right off my nose and scratched my face. I was lucky this time that my eyes were spared.

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

This is so cool! And the end result is pretty, unlike chicken wire.

It reminds me of a "living fence" tutorial I saw on youtube...except this seems more doable for me. But similar cottage/whimsical look.

Exactly! I have two foot chicken wire fences to form compartments around the house, so that i can keep the ducks out of some spots to give the grass a chance to recover. Just in two years the shiny wires have turned grayish-dark and have turned into a tripping hazard. I plan to have all these death-traps replaced with wattle fences. But that will take a lot of time.

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

I finished this part of the fence on Friday afternoon by weaving the last branches in, here is a picture with an orange bucket in front, so that you can see how tall it is:

After that, i dug up the veggie bed, so that the frost can get into the ground, kill most of the bugs and soften the soil. The ducks used this opportunity to help themselves to some additional protein:

Today (Saturday) i was busy with other stuff, but i managed to remove all the flagstones and rammed three poles into the ground for the next section of the fence. Tomorrow i will have to harvest more fencing material…

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

Update: As usual i was caught up with other stuff before i could sneak out of the house to indulge my new hobby… I had about 1½ to 2 hours of time to collect new fencing material, so i went up the hill where young trees have started to overgrow the pasture and started to clean up the area. I did not just mowed down all trees and harvested the branches, but removed the lower branches from the thicker trees, so that they will grow taller and have thicker stems that i can harvest for fence posts later. Those lower branches are my new fencing material. In spots where the trees grew too close together to each other i removed the smaller or the crooked ones, so that the other's have more light and room to grow.
Here is the result of today's work, a garden cart full of long branches that will be woven into the fence tomorrow:

I need to figure out another way to transport that stuff back home, the garden-cart became top-heavy and toppled over twice today, twisting my wrist and i lost one of my pruning shears in the tall grass. Fortunately the one with the bent blade…

 

[BirdsBeesTrees]

Your fence is truly a work of art. It's so beautiful.