TheFarmOfDreams- a long awaited adventure

[SageHill]

HOLY MOLY!!! That's a blankety blanket of snow. YIKES.
So sorry about your fence - that hurts.
Out here I have 2x4 woven no-climb. Pulled super tight using a bobcat, top and bottom wires and metal bars as well, extra fence posts metal tube 3 in? set in concrete and cross braced, the rest are T-posts. Though we don't get snow ever - I see it only on the mountaintops when it happens (very pretty when framed in palm trees).

 

[farmerjan]

We used to fence our horses in with 4-6 strands of barbed wire and they were fine. But horse people nowadays have a heart attack if you mention it. The one thing they don't do with single strands of wire, like barbed wire, is "walk it down" like they do with woven wire... be it 2x4, 4x4 , or the standard 6" "field fence" that is pretty much standard on most cattle farms here. That is what we use for all the fences for the cattle, but I am going to use 4x4 at the house to help to keep the chickens in which the 6" stays will not do as good. It also helps to keep out more predators... coyotes and foxes don't "slip through" 4" stays like they can on 6" stays.

Wood posts aren't going to bend from heavy snow weight as much as a steel T-post will. The reason we use mostly wooden is for the ability to put a board on the top if we need to. We don't do that out in long stretches of fencing along the woods and such. But we still like the strength and stability of wood posts. You cannot pull against T-posts like you can against a wood post... handy also for repairing a stretch of fence that say a tree falls on.

And regardless of what you fence with, you are going to need a strand of wire that you can electrify along the top to keep the horses from reaching over.... they will push the woven wire over and down with reaching; horses just do that. I had appaloosas for years and someone was always reaching... I liked the barbed wire... they were alot less pushy to reach across it.
We run a strand of barbed wire along the top of all woven wire fences to help discourage the cows from reaching over... and some places it is put up with insulators so it can be electrified.

 

[Thefarmofdreams]

Thanks for all the feedback!
I DEFINITELY plan on electrifying the fence regardless of what type of woven wire is behind the electric. I don't trust anything to stay in without electric Until this storm, they were in JUST electric (although its FIVE strands, closely spaced and BITEY). So we will definitely be using both. I'll definitely plan for a lot of extra wood posts in the perimeter fence... maybe we will just do all wood. It's already gonna take forever to get it done. What's an extra year of saving at this point?

We're going to be getting a 50hp tractor with bucket and 3 point... probably from the 70s-80s given our price range. I wonder if it would have more luck tightening the fence, or if I need to reconsider the no climb. Hmm.

Looking at the failed fence... I'm not sure if having high tensile would've helped. It's all the insulators that have failed. Snapped off, all of them. And theyre the "good" ones from premier 1 too. Are high tensile insulators stronger, or should I plan on de-stringing the fence if we have a nasty storm forecasted? At least future fences will have a physical component as well as the electric, so taking the wire down won't completely remove the fence.

@Baymule I've read your fence journal and am on a second read through before we start fencing, lol. There's a lot of good info in there. I didn't realize you still didn't have it tight enough when all was said and done though!

I spent the morning outside, but now the toddler needs a break. I got the path from the house to the barn wide enough for my 3 wheeler. And the path from the fence to the manure area.... but the path from the barn to the fence is still too narrow, and the manure area doesn't go far enough off the path yet.... slow progress. Lunch, and then I have to go help scrape alllllllll this snow off the roofs... it is supposed to start raining tomorrow... 🤞my buildings standing.... sigh.

 

[Thefarmofdreams]

It's 50*. It's gonna pour all day tomorrow. 💩💩💩💩

 

[murphysranch]

Having gone to High School in Rochester NY, back in the early 70's, I remember more about the mess of old snow. And the melting...............................................................

 

[Thefarmofdreams]

Having gone to High School in Rochester NY, back in the early 70's, I remember more about the mess of old snow. And the melting...............................................................

Yeaaaaaaa. We're desperately hoping for a very slow thaw this year. Idk how we're gonna keep water out of the buildings if it thaws too fast.

 

[Baymule]

Wow. First slammed by snow, now rain. I hope your buildings don’t flood.

 

[Mini Horses]

That amount of snow and livestock?? Doesn't work well.😫

 

[Thefarmofdreams]

That amount of snow and livestock?? Doesn't work well.😫

Not at all. They're toasty warm in the barn but bound to get stir crazy soon.

 

[farmerjan]

Years ago, in Vermont and NH and Maine, and I am sure in NY, big barns were built for the winter/cold weather... Big lofts stored tons of hay for animal feed for the winter. Second floor center aisles were for feed/grain and some machinery storage. The bottom floor was for the animals... and the cows were all in stanchions. There were gutters behind the cows and they were cleaned out daily.
But what I am getting at... is the farmhouse was attached to all the different sheds/barns/pens for the winter. So the farmer did not have to go outside in the cold miserable weather; the animals did not go out to suffer through the cold and snow and ice. The farmer did not get lost in snowstorms/blizzards between the house and the different sheds.
My extended family in VT had a dairy... The farm house had a wood shed attached to the house, the winters' wood was stored in there and kept dry and accessible. From there they went into a repair shop/storage type small shed... There was a door on the back of that for the old outhouse..(🥶 )...went through the shop into an attached corn crib for ear corn.....and through another shed had the chickens in part of it... all the meat birds had been killed for the winter and only the layers and the roosters for fertile eggs were kept and fed through the winter.... then there was the BIG BARN... with the dairy cattle in the stanchions, the milk house closest to the house and then the cows and at the end, sorta off into an L were the calf pens but still under the big barn roof... and there was one good sized pen with the 2 sows and a smaller pen with the boar hog. They actually had an L built out off the big barn for the hogs but if it was real cold, they brought them inside.... The hay in the mow, the cattle in the barn with the doors closed kept it in the 40's and above to where the water did not hardly freeze.... The hogs were in deep bedding... they weren't cleaned out until a thaw and they were able to spread cow manure and the part where the hogs did their manure was partially cleaned out, to keep it a little cleaner. But the chickens were not cleaned until spring, as well as alot of manure from the cows that was stored outside in a "manure pile", and whatever the hogs etc made... as it was spread in the spring for fertilizer for the fields.
The floor directly above the cows was for hay storage on the sides and an aisle in the center for whatever they needed to get inside. Some barns had a 3rd floor for the hay fork on the hay trolley that ran the length of the barn center beam, with a big door at one end that you could lift the hay up and then it could travel to where you needed it and it got forked to where you needed it.
There was alot of handwork and forking, shoveling back in the day....