Is barbed wire a good choice?

[Matthew]

I was looking for some advice about fencing. I have fenced a two acre pasture using cedar posts and barbed wire. I want to keep beef cows and draft horses and may be a pony for my kids. Some people say barbed wire is the worst stuff you could have around animals. I lived on a farm that was all barbed wire and we had draft horses and cows and never had a problem. Is barbed wire OK or were we lucky no animals got hurt? Anouther question is I used high tensile barbed wire it seemes thin but it is supposed to be strong. Is this wire any good?

[OldKat]

@Matthew 14361 wrote:

I was looking for some advice about fencing. I have fenced a two acre pasture using cedar posts and barbed wire. I want to keep beef cows and draft horses and may be a pony for my kids. Some people say barbed wire is the worst stuff you could have around animals. I lived on a farm that was all barbed wire and we had draft horses and cows and never had a problem. Is barbed wire OK or were we lucky no animals got hurt? Anouther question is I used high tensile barbed wire it seemes thin but it is supposed to be strong. Is this wire any good?

I have a lot that is not a whole lot bigger than that; which adjoins another couple of acres that belongs to another guy, but which I use. I have found that mesh field fence works best for me, but it is reinforced on the top with barbed wire to keep the horses from leaning over it and pushing it toward the ground. Otherwise they will “walk” it down trying to get that tasty morsel that is always growing just on the other side of the fence. It is also reinforced with high tensile electric fence, which stands off from the fence some 5 or 6″ and is about the same distance from the top. This further discourages any effort to graze over the top, AND keeps them off the barbed wire.

I too have used barbed wire for horses on pasture (larger pastures, like 20 or more acres per field). I don’t particullarly like using it for horses, but cannot say that it has ever actually caused me a problem. THE POTENTIAL is there never-the-less.

I have also used it for part of the fenceline on smaller lots like you are describing. I never had a problem with it, but was always worried that I would. I would not do it that way again, personally. Guess it depends on how well you can sleep at night without wondering if your horses are down there slicing and dicing themselves on the barbed wire.

I like high tensile electric fence wire, but would never use it around horses unless it was simply reinforcing a more visible fence such as I am doing. One single strand of it on T posts is darned near invisible until you get right up on it and I wouldn’t trust it for use with any horse no matter how calm they are. Maybe if it is in multiple strands and with wide electric tape as a visible barrier at the top, but even that would make me nervous.

High tensile barbed wire; aka known as Gaucho wire. I know people that think it is the premium wire out there. I will not use it. It is harder to work with when new. Darned near impossible to work with when it is used. I know a local guy that pronounces it “Gotcha” wire. I use to think that was because he didn’t know how to say it correctly. After having “tried” to patch fences that have that stuff installed, I now think he is onto something. It is beyond a shadow of a doubt the hardest crap that I have ever had the misfortune of working around. I have been told that it will easily outlast regular barbed wire, if that is important to you.

Just my 2 cents.

[blue80]

I guess I’m one of the unlucky ones…

Well I was lucky enough to tag along with my dad, a veterinarian, on “calls” saturdays and emergencies, every since I drove my mom crazy. Age 3 I think?:rolleyes:
Countless times “we” were treating leg and shoulder wounds from barbed wire injuries, usually younger animals, or animals recently purchased.

Then, when I purchased a farm in Indiana, we put over a thousand hours on a backhoe tractor remediating age old fencelines which had become 50 feet wide with multiple eras and strands of barbed wire. After each given 5 or so acres was “cleared” we’d open it up to the belgians. Somehow we missed a piece, which later we found embedded in the middle of a spruce tree, it cut one mare wide and deep, looked like a letter sized envelope wide open. It was right in the pressure point of the collar area, I thought I had ruined her.
Thankfully, I called my dad for free vet advice, and was told to pack the wound with hydrated lime once a day and pull off only proud flesh. Three months later, no scar was visible and she was good as new;

One foxtrotter filly we bought at auction a few months ago decided to jump a 5 ft. tall barbed wire fence and stand in the hightway; but didn’t quite make it, got a light laceration on the leg.

My neighbour called a few weeks ago, wanted to borrow a round pen; He had bought a new mare which had been bullied by some of his other horses pushed into a barbed wire fence which tore into its leg to the bone….

I am a believer that when you know better, you should do better. Because I’ve been bitten in the past, I am motivated to highly recommend use of electric, even one strand on top of/offset the barbed wire is highly effective. My favourite, again, is electrobraid, a highly visible, high tensile electric fence system. I believe use of this fencing will actually appreciate your property.
And located in a “fence em out” state, I am also motivated to keep the neighbours hungry cattle out of my alfalfa and hay pile; experience speaking again here:(

Horses have to respect fences, for their own good, and we have to help them do so.
And don’t even get me started on goats….

Kevin

[Big Horses]

My family has lived on this ranch since the early 40’s, and up until the early 80’s we always had around 100 head of horses at a time. In that time, we lost 3 horses from injuries…. one of which got pushed into a cattle guard by the other horses, and had to be put down, the other 2 were from fence accidents. We use barbed wire on almost everything, and the 2 horses that we did lose were both from a wooden fence. They got run into it and pushed along the rail which split and ran into their chest, killing them…but not instantly. We also had one that got a huge chunk taken out of his neck as a foal, from a wooden fence. We’ve had a few cuts and such, from the wire, but they’re fixable. Needless to say, I very seldom use anything but barbed wire..it works for us.
John

[Gabe Ayers]

It’s like an old timers said once, “the key to good fencing is to keep the horses on the side where the feed is”.

Culture keeps them in, but the mechanics are a consideration. We use barbed wire everywhere too, just as tradition, was already here, is available and most of our fence work is repair or in some cases – resurrection.

We will be doing some cross fencing and improved fencing on our woodlots this summer so we haven’t decided what to use yet either. I really like the higher quality barbed wire over the smaller sharper stuff, just for the bulk of it and the ease of handling, installing and maintaining the fence. When a deer runs through the small wire it coils back up and makes a good impromptu snare, the thicker wire is more malleable and when it breaks it just lays there and doesn’t coil back up.

Having forest products as a part of our business we do have some board fences in the barnyard area and all of them have an electric fence inside the top board to keep the horses off the boards.

We also use a single strand of electric to rotate in the grazing season, once they know it they don’t try it.

~

[Does’ Leap]

I just spent hours removing miles of barbed wire from adjacent farm we recently purchased. I can’t understand the use of barbed wire, when high-tensile electrified steel wire is: (1) cheaper; (2) easier to install; (3) safer; and (4) more durable. We run 6 strands of high tensile for our goat herd and subdivide with net fence. If I were just running horses I would run 1 high tensile wire using j-hooks at trees for corners and support posts as needed (wood with insulators). I would put plastic flagging periodically to make sure the horses learn where the fence is. I regularly cut limbs and trees off my fences with no ill-effects which would down most barbed wire and standard steel fences. The only additional cost is an energizer (preferably low-impedance). If you decide to go with electrified wire Kencove.com is a good resource. The use of electrified high-tensile steel also gives you the flexibility to graze other animals like sheep or goats who couldn’t be contained by barbed wire.

Good luck.

George

[Matthew]

Thanks for the advice sounds like a split decision some like it some dont.

[Plowboy]

We have used barbed wire almost exclusively and sometimes in conjunction with electric fencing. Good barbed wire fences with heavier gauge wire strung tight will cause hardly more than a scratch on a horses hide. The problem with barbed wire is that not everybody keeps good fences and when allowed to droop or coil as Jason pointed out with the worthless Gaucho wire and it is able to get wrapped around a leg or something it can cause damage. High tensile wire will cut to the bone instantly crippling or severely injuring many horses that I know of, a couple of which had to be shot because of the severity. With good fences and good management a nice tight barb wire fence with electric on top is about as good as you can get unless you can afford poly boards or heavy plank fencing. Electric is good when the power is on or the ground is working well on the solar types but I like a good strong perimeter fence that keeps my animals in when I’m not home in case of failure. Before winter set in I started building new fences on my property for draft horses and beef cattle. 7ft driven Locust posts, 4 strands barbed wire with electric on top to prevent reaching.

[Big Horses]

One reason the smooth electric wire wont work for alot of our fence is that it’s miles to the nearest “current bush”. 😉
John

[grey]

Barbed wire is for enclosing large tracts of pasture for large livestock. Two acres is kind of on the small side of what I’d consider safe to fence with barbed wire. It kind of depends on what’s going on inside those two acres. Do the animals inside get along with each other? Do they have enough food? Are they young? Old? Do they tear around or are they pretty quiet?

I don’t like seeing barbed wire separating two areas that both have animals. Visiting or bickering across a barbed wire fence is bad news.

For smaller areas (like paddocks), I like a board fence with 6″ standoffs holding two strands of hotwire – one at the top and one at about horse-knee-height. A board fence provides a psychological barrier, but mainly I like it as a very visual framework to hold up my hotwire.

For cross-fencing for rotational grazing in small-medium pastures I like hot tape and step-in posts.

If I were in your shoes, with as many animals as you have planned to put in a 2 acre pasture, I think I would maybe go with the smooth high-tensile fence and put a zap to it. I’d be a little nervous with such a mixed crowd in that size of a field.

Growing up, we had lots of barbed wire fences… miles and miles of it, and few injuries. But I think that’s the key: miles and miles of fence means acres and acres of land. It’s unlikely that an animal is going to be spending much time fiddling around near the barbed wire when he’s got so many acres at his disposal.

[Tim Harrigan]

Grey: I like your assessment.

[J-L]

Most of the problems with barbed wire is wire that is down or not tight. If you keep it stretched and stapled up good you’ll be fine. I’ve had horses get wire cut but not often.
Last time I checked the high tensile electric was fairly expensive. It’s cheaper for me to use barbed. In this country it’ll last a lifetime and is easy to fix. There is fence on my place that was put in in the 1930’s and is still up. The cedar posts are still too hard to pound staples in.
When we had a horse or two get cut it was fighting other horses through the fence. One neighbor turned a stud horse out next to one of our horse pastures and didn’t bother to tell anyone. Needless to say we had a mare in heat and both her and the stud got in the wire.
I did have a horse get cut in the woven wire fence too.

[jac]

We have barb on the top strand on the perimiter and its kept tight. We have a lot of hedges so that helps keep the horses off the wire.. For division we have a batery power electric job with 2 strands of 2″ white tape for visability. That usualy works fine , though we had a pony once that got zapped at least 7 times in the space of 10 minutes before she gave up:)
John

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