I’ve owned horses for over 15 years, but I’ve only ever boarded. I’m now at a point where the boarding situation has just gotten too frustrating and I think it’s time to move on. I’ve daydreamed for years of bringing my two home to my 5 acres and it may be happening very soon. The only problem is that my property is all wooded and clearing out any significant amount trees (any really) isn’t an option right now. Therefore their “pasture” will be very tree filled, and at their current barn there are two similarly wooded pastures. So I know it’s workable, but I’m not sure what my best fencing option is. Electric would be difficult due to the distance from the house, so I’d prefer not to resort to that unless needed. My horses are both very calm, older, and never test fences (they only check to see if gates have been left unlatched lol). Cost and ease of installation are very important factors. I’m thinking maybe either woven wire mesh fencing with a top board or I have a friend of a friend who is selling some extra rolls of flex fence…or I’m not sure what else. Something that wouldn’t be totally destroyed from a large branch or tree falling would be a plus if it exists. I’d appreciate any thoughts and advice, I have zero experience with fencing beyond nailing up a fallen board here and there. I’m thinking between 4’ and 5’ tall, not sure on post spacing…
I’d be more concerned (first) about the species of trees in your woods. Some can be VERY poisonous to horses. Black walnut can cause laminitis – maple leaves (red maple) if eaten in the ‘wilt’ stage (like if a branch falls and leaves start to die) are poisonous – black cherry trees and black locust are bad too, and oaks are really bad. Since grass doesn’t grow well in woods, your horses just might decide to eat the trees/leaves.
What is your budget? That might determine just what kind of fencing you can afford. If you are looking at wood posts, top rail of wood and wire mesh, expect it to be fairly expensive. Sinking posts is labor intensive and needs to be done correctly as is spacing them the appropriate distance. We did a small pasture ourselves when we first bought our farm. We rented a 2 person gas powered post hole digger, made things easier but it was still a lot of back breaking work. Four and a half feet high is standard, posts set on 6 foot centers is the general rule. You don’t want posts that are set too far apart, the fence won’t hold up. Posts are sunk 3’ in our area and dry cement is added to the post hole when refilling it; it must also be tamped sufficiently.
Find how much fence you need then price the materials yourself to see what it would cost for you to install v/s contracting it.
A lot depends on your location, but 8’ or 10’ apart is usually plenty sufficient. 6’ apart seems like overkill to me. Also, again depends on location, but I’ve always been told that you do not want to concrete in every single fence post. Other than adding an extreme amount of cost, it makes it impossible to ever change the layout of your farm or replace posts or what-have-you. You can’t pull out a concreted post, you usually cut it off at ground level and put a new one in next to it. That’ll mess up your spacing in the future, if that’s a concern. I’ve only concreted corner and gate posts.
Flex fence is nice, or woven wire with a top board. The latter is my favorite. Our fences are all 4’. When we start replacing it (new farm purchase, old fence), I really really want to do 4’ woven with a top board, and a second top board at 5’.
For 4’ height, I’m fine with three boards, if you go the all-boards route. We have three-board fences and woven wire with top board fences, as well as two pastures with three-line electric polyrope fences. Our property is a mish-mash right now, but we’re less than a year with it and bought it this way. Our posts vary between 8’ and 10’ apart.
For 5’ height, four board looks better.
For electric, you can purchase solar energizers so you do not have to run electric from your house, but it may not be feasible depending on your location and if you can’t find a non-wooded place for it.
Setting posts is the worst part. Perhaps pay someone to do that, and save some money by doing the rest yourself?
Ease of installation rules out wood posts, to be honest. If you want something easy, T-posts are the winner. I don’t recommend T-post fencing for property perimeter, but creating separate fields inside it’s great. You can use T-posts for Flex fence, I believe.
Nope, t-posts won’t work for flex fence. They will work for the coated electric and non-electric wire products which are made by the companies who also make the flex fence. You can get sleeves to put over the posts for the wire.
By all means, find out what kind of trees you have. County extension offices should be able to help. If you plan on clearing later, you may want to go more temporary–t posts. Most fencing you can use t-posts will need wood corner
and gate posts.
8 foot is a very common post spacing, followed by 10 and 12. Depends on type of horses, type of fencing, ya da da da. If you chose a wire type product, don’t go more than 12 feet even in Bubba Joe says you can do 30.
We had a fairly treed lot in Colorado and used Centaur’s PolyPlus on wood posts. Around the yard, we left the non-climb and wood post toppers to keep dogs in.
Good to know, thanks!
Thanks for all of the replies!
I am looking into confirming all of our tree species, but as I live in the same area as the boarding stable and there’s many horses in my area around trees so all of our trees should be pretty much the same kinds I would think. If I’m not mistaken, black walnut trees are only dangerous in the form of shavings, correct? Most of our trees are some sort of maple, I believe silver and sugar, but I do want to make sure. I know for a fact there are oak trees in their current pastures and many others around me and there’s never been an issue. And trust me their pastures are mainly weeds and then bare by end of summer at the boarding stable, so I’m not too concerned about the oaks. Especially since these trees are a good 75-100+ feet tall, removing them would not be an easy feat. We do A LOT of leaf blowing in the fall and would do my best to remove the acorns as well, but again current barn does nothing to remove them and no issues with 40 horses.
As of right now, I’m thinking 4 1/2 to 5 ft tall with 8 ft spacing and starting out with just a 75’ x 100’ area. T posts would be nice in the sense of being able to try this lay out for a bit and see what works and be able to adjust, but t posts make me nervous as being the sole barrier fence, and then I would definitely be limited to woven wire without a top board of any kind or electric. There’s no way we would be able to use solar here, way too much shade. And when you add in the cost of adding electric the savings in t posts vs wood posts pretty much disappears in my calculations so far. It’s all a lot to think about…scary and exciting…
Oh…one more thing, I did see a fence with a top rail and then 4 strands of a coated non-electric wire. I thought it looked nice and seemed to be a little less costly, but wondered about safety? Does anyone have any personal experience with this type of wire? Individual strands make me nervous even though my horses are extremely low key. My gelding respected non working electric tape cross fencing even as other horses were tearing it down, walking under, running through it, etc… Lol
Check to see if you have a local saw mill around. We have one near us and buying rails from him and pressure treated posts from the big box stores is the cheapest way to put up a permanent fence. He only charges $3 or $4 for a 8 or 10’ 1x6 board.
DH built replaced our electric smooth wire fencing with Kencote poly coated wire last summer. I would have preferred to use the Hotcote so we could have hooked up the fencer if necessary; he preferred the look and 30 year vs 20 year warranty of the Kencote. (We had been trying to agree on a type of new fencing for several years, so I compromised). This type of fencing is supposed to be very safe if you keep it tensioned. We have not had any issues, but both horses are respectful of fencing.
In post #5, BasqueMom says she had used Centaur’s PolyPlus (which is the same type of product as Kencote) on a wooded lot. I can see that unwinding the wire might be tough in a wooded area. Maybe she can give you some pointers if you go with a coated wire. Our land is flat, open pasture, so it was relatively easy to unwind the wire with a spinning jenny on a trailer pulled by our ATV.
T-post with woven wire is not sturdy enough for horses, will collapse if a large branch or small tree falls on it, and will sag sag sag. Plus weeds and vines will climb it and it’s impossible to weed whack. And since you are wooded and not grassy pasture, the horses will lean on it trying to eat stuff on the other side. If you are going to do a wire mesh, you need very sturdy posts and the fence stretched good and tight, and it may still be destroyed by a tree or large branch.
I replaced almost all my board and wire mesh fence with an electric tape fence with a top board, spaced at 8 feet. I have one small 4 board paddock and one small wire mesh paddock with a top board for the small livestock. I can’t tell you how ugly and saggy the old wire mesh fence was. It was a DIY job by the old owner, and I’m sure it looked good when they did it, but 10 years later it was a mess. And the old 4 board fence was nothing but constantly replacing fence boards. The horses do not touch the electric fence, and the top board presents a visual physical barrier. A tree fell on it, and the only repair I needed to make was to the top board, which broke. The electric tape just stretched and was easily put back into place.
Depending on your area, installed 4 board fence will run you over $8 per linear foot, wire mesh or 3 board over $7 per linear foot, and electric tape with a top board about $5 per linear foot.
I don’t like the high tensile wire, even if coated. And people will debate which fence is “safer” if a horse runs through it, but I just don’t see how you can split that hair other than my dislike of high tensile wire.
Oh, and congrats on bringing the horses home and welcome to the world of never ending chores!!! But it’s so great to look out your windows at your horses, and being able to give them a pat in your pj’s before going to bed.
Our turnouts are in a clearing, surrounded by Douglas Fir, Alder, and Vine Maple forest. We plan to expand their space into the woods – a project that should keep me out of trouble for some time to come…
Falling branches and trees will definitely bring down no-climb and field fence. My philosophy is, if a tree falls in the forest, it will land on my fence. Over the past 13 years, two heavy wooden corner posts have snapped, one now tilts at a rakish angle, and numerous t-posts have been pushed over, even though they were pounded in far past their blades – up to three feet. The woven wire fencing itself, however, has survived (with a bit of reshaping). With this property we inherited a length of v-mesh fencing, and that appears to stand up to anything. It is expensive, but this fencing will outlive me.
My horses don’t challenge the fence to get out, but they do try to reach that greener grass on the other side. I’ve learned that no-climb fencing can indeed be climbed – my 38 inch gelding wedges his hooves into the 2-inch wide openings and gradually bends the fence down. Silly boy seems to forget that he can clear the 48 inch fence from a standstill – destruction is much more fun!
Keep a close eye on what is growing outside your fence. In addition to dangerous trees, many toxic shrubs and herbaceous plants grow in the woods. We clear all weeds about two or three feet from the fenceline to avoid temptation.
Due to tree roots you’ll have to be flexible in t-post placement. Keep them in a straight line, but you’ll likely have to vary your spacing to avoid roots. Check out your ground – you may need extra tall t-posts to get a solid placement.
