Keeping barbed wire fences tight?what痴 the secret?

[iqraceworks]

I致e got a small little 塗obby farm on 6 acres. I致e divided the 6 acres into several different grazing areas for the animals. I did 4 acres initially a few years ago, and recently I did the remaining two. Both times I used 8 diameter wood corner posts for the H-brace corner braces, and buried them 4ft in the ground?hey are not moving. I知 using 6ft t-posts every 10ft of fence. I used the 14ga Red Brand barbed wire, stretching it pretty tight with a com-a-long, and after I pull it and nail it?everything it as tight as a guitar string.

Fast forward a few weeks??.all of the wire is pretty floppy and loose. Not sagging loose, but definitely not as tight as it was when I first did it. The corner braces are stout and are not moving, and I used a good quality wire?.what did I do wrong?

Also, some of the fence that I put up last year has gotten really loose from the cows pushing and scratching on it?besides pulling the staples out of the posts and pulling the wire to tighten it back up, is there an easier was to tighten it back up?

 

[sixdogs]

I fenced with high tensile smooth wire and springs in the line (Kencove Fence) and no problems. I'll guess the barb wire is getting pushed by cows or whatever and just a little bit of slack feels worse than it is. For barb wire, you can buy a simple tool that twists it tight again with sort-of a knot. It works great and here's a picture of one of the types. There are several.





On the high tensile, I lived in New England and ran 17 gauge high tensile wire for 3/4 mile stretches and pulled tight as a banjo string. Lots of springs and a real jolt of fence charger worked great. Every now and then a moose would run through and while they might break a line post, the wire just hung in there and suspended the post.

 

[Soundguy]

agreed, fence tool to tighten the line, or a spring tightner.

could even use a turnbuckle.

 

[Alien]

Or, run a single strand of electric fence along until the cattle stop stretching it. Half my electric fences are not working now but the horses won't go near them. They learned that they bite a few years ago.

 

[buckeyefarmer]

Cows do like to rub on barb wire. I believe barb is less maintenance than high tensile. I'd put a wire stretcher on it and retighten.

 

[farmer2009]

As long as you didn't drive your staples tight it's fairly easy to tighten. Add a staple or two at each corner post to pull the wire around the post. Or take a corner loose and re stretch. Depends on how much slack there is. Replacing the middle wire staples with insulators and making it hot will stop cattle from pushing on the fence.

Barbed wire will self loosen after installing. It's worst if you didn't use the high tensile barbed wire. The high tensile will loosen once maybe twice. The old wire would loosen every year or two.

If you drove the staples tight then it'll require adding a staple every other post as the wire won't slip.

 

[Creamer]

I put up a lot of barbed wire fence when I was younger - miles of it. Never had it come loose like you are talking about unless the cattle rubbed on it. We always used 12 gage though - not sure if that would make a difference. The bottom line is that for it to come loose either the end posts have to move, the wire has to stretch, or the staples allow the wire to go up or down.

Cattle do like to scratch on it - you need to provide them something else to rub on or they will tear a fence down. We had cattle oilers that were mounted at an angle and tied on both ends allowing the cattle to go under or over and rub however they wished. They had chains running along them that worked very well - they seemed to like them better than the fences. When we had the hanging oilers the fences saw more action and damage.

 

[GGB]

We just had a new high tensile barbed wire fence put up in our south pasture by our fence guy, and it's a thing of beauty! But we will still put up an electric fence standoff to keep the cattle off the barbed wire-no sense in letting the cows use the new fence for their scratch posts.

One of the issues we have had is snow drifts on the east-west fence runs; those drifts can do a surprisingly good job of loosening a fence. A few years ago we found this out in a new section of fence in a pasture where the cattle had not even been grazing after being redone. Add a few weeds into the mix and it can get even more pronounced with snow weighting down the wire. And then there's the occasional flood for good measure.

We finally realized that us mere mortals were no match for stronger willed cattle, so we called in a true fence pro; he can do more in one day than we could in a week, and it will far outlast our own workmanship. But as I said, we still use an electric fence standoff-don't want to take any unnecessary chances with his work of art!

 

[turnkey4099]

I helped a farmer fix a 'down' fence. He had a tool for tightening the wire that worked like a dream. Sort of plier like, two jaws, one with 3 prongs, one with two. apply to wire, squeeze and it left two "v" dimples in the wire. Amazing how much slack would come out with onely a few applications. I've looked (not all that hard though) and finally home built one using vice grips with a pieces of angle iron welded to the jaws. Only make one dimple but it works.

Harry K

 

[oosik]

I have 1.5 miles of barbed wire around my 80 acres. It will stretch some after installation, naturally. Its tighter in the winter, looser in the summer. Cows rubbing/stretching thru and young calves pushing thru will loosen it in spots also. In the summer Russian thistle(tumble weeds) blows up against it and the wind will then stretch it somewhat. Four strand barbed wire fence becomes more of a visual barrier after time, rather than a complete physical barrier. The cows will acknowledge that its there and their trails will be along side the fence.

Actually, if a cow wants to come thru the fence for some really important reason - their calf is on the other side & bawling - a barbed wire fence is only a very slight deterrent. I find that barbed wire fencing requires, at least, seasonal maintenance. T-posts get pushed over, connectors loosen & fall off, calves push thru and cause the wire to sag in spots, for some unknown reason strands will break - - the list is almost endless.

As turnkey4099 mentioned - its far better to put V-dimples in the wire than actually twisting it to take up slack. Twisting will weaken the wire at that spot, it can remove the galvanized protection and the wire will rust. The result is that under pressure - from a scratching cow - the wire can break at a spot where it is twisted.

A fellow down the road is an acknowledged paranoid individual. He put up a six foot high chain link fence, out riggers on top with two strands of barbed wire on that. The posts are 3" heavy duty galvy pipe - set in concrete. We all thought that was about as maintenance proof as possible. Later we learned that his constant problem is the wildlife - coyotes, skunk, badger, raccoon - dig giant holes under the fence that he is constantly having to fix. Also there are a couple spots where the deer have found they can jump this fence and they refuse to jump back out.

You will also find that cheaper barbed wire(low carbon content) will tend to stretch more. I have 10 gauge high carbon barbed wire and when stretched tight with good anchor points it will stay tight for years. Its a much more difficult "instal" but when you are finished its there for a long time.