# Fence Maintenance



## Hasligrove (Dec 10, 2008)

Ok..first don't hate me for this statement...but I have too much browse. Piticularly on the outside of the goat pen. I swear I could walk all around the fence and then suddenly it's REALLY overgrown. That's what happens here in the Pacific Northwest. So I'm trying to figure out the best way to keep the fences clear. Yes, I should let my goats eat it...but it's on the back side of their pasture where I can't see from the house so I hate to stake the goats out there. I don't really have the time so sit with them and anyways...if they are not staked...they don't seem to eat what I want them to eat. Besides, I have to weed wack the area on the inside since it is grass knee high. You'd think the goats would eat that but they have too much other better browse and hay so they don't pay attention to it. My hubby thinks I'm nuts and shouldn't be feeding the goats hay at all with all the browse they have in their pen. I've tried it and they are too used to the hay and they start looking skinny and whine a lot. Plus...don't want to kill everything all at once. I'm sure it will be a barren waste land soon enough. I'm thinking of renting a billy goat (the machine-walk behind brush cutter) to wack it all down. Is there anyone else that battles the brush on the outside of the fence areas? Any other ideas? It's alot of salmon berry which the goats love. I could just start cutting by hand and throwing into the goat pen for them to eat....but there is something VERY satisfying to just demolish the problem quickly. :twisted: 

Maybe I need to post an add "Free browse...you haul!" :lol:


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## Blueroan (Mar 6, 2010)

we do bush hog our pastures for weeds before they go to seed. Just like your yard, the more grass you mow, the less weeds you have. My goats will eat leaves off the trees and graze in the pasture but prefere the woods. If I want to clear my lines, I use ag roundup. Not the same stuff you get in the hardware store but the 2 gallon container that you buy at the farm store. It is stronger and you need a license to buy it in NC. You mix it about 3-4 oz to 4gallons of pack back sprayer. You can add some surfactant or some dish washing detergent to the mix. Walk around and spray the other side of the fence. In a couple of weeks, it will kill all the weeds. I also like rotating animals. I have a small dexter cow. She would be great to put inside your fenced in area. You would not have to bush hog. My horse tend to eat all the good stuff and will eat pasture down to the root system. Tekapoo orchardgrass is more close grazing tolerant for the horses and it is very palatable for all the animals.


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## ryorkies (May 4, 2010)

how about moveable fence panels.
Goats would be safer that way.
Put them in the temporary browse
pen during the day and back in
permanent home at night.


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## Blueroan (Mar 6, 2010)

I would use panels also and let the goat have access to some browse. Here is a pic of how I use horse panels around the farm.









I would use what we call pig panels or pig fence. They run about 15-16 dollars a section and are about 15 feet long. Very easy to tie together. another option is poultry electric fence but it is expensive.


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## Hasligrove (Dec 10, 2008)

Well electric is out of the question. It's so dense brush here that I'd have to mow a path for the fence. If i have to do that I might as well just mow the path along the fence line. I like the horse panels. I might be ably to crash that through the brush. Are the pig panels you are talking about steel tubes like the horse panel but shorter? Or are they the large diameter solid wire type? Do you have a photo? I'll take anything that's 15-16 dollars a panel. Fencing is very expensive here. What I call hog panels (solid wire panel not steel tube) is 16ft long and 3ft high and run around $30-35 each. The taller panels go for $45-60 each! I've never priced the steel tube panels here. I've gotten a 12ft gate and I think it was over $100 if I remember correctly.


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## Blueroan (Mar 6, 2010)

I sent you a picture to your email of some hog panels.


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## jross (Dec 20, 2008)

You are very lucky to have all that free, high quality goat chow growing right there! The trick is to figure out how to use it easily. The last thing I would do is poison it and waste it. But, being a desert rat, I see vegetation differently than people from lush places do.

What if you made your fence out of 16 ft livestock panels, and had 2 sets of posts that they could attach to? One set of posts is outside the other set. Move the fence every few weeks, inward to let the weeds grow up, then back out again when the salad bar has been regrown. They aren't that hard to drag around if you have a helper. The trick would be coming up with a simple, strong, and easy way of attaching them to the posts (old baling wire or twine, lengths of light chain with clips, etc). If your goats have horns or scurs, they can get their heads stuck in the cheaper livestock panels. By cheap I mean $25-$30 here. There is a kind that has openings about 3 1/2" top to bottom, and are about 5 ft high, but they are much more expensive.


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## Perry (May 8, 2009)

It does not help your 'brush on the other side of the fence' problem, but my guys just browse from April till late October. I think your boys would adjust to â€˜no hayâ€™, if you give it more time.


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