I absolutely have to replace our paddock fencing this spring. I would use horseguard polytape fencing but I own a tack store and can get other brands at wholesale. With minimal extra money and lots of projects it seems I need to take advantage of my wholesale options. I can get patriot, zareba, stafix, or dare polyrope or patriot, dare, or zareba polytape. Anyone have experience with one brand over the others? Is polyrope or polytape safer? Thanks for any insight!
Love horse guard, don’t know about the other brands. That said, I’d go any brand of tape over any brand of cord. I hauled a few horses that had been injured in electric cord fencing in the 15 years I spent doing emergency horse transport to area horsepitals. JMO but it’s not hugely different than smooth wire when they get hung up in it, They may be more crush injuries than straight up degloving, but the prognosis can be just as dire. Never had to transport a horse injured in tape. FWIW.
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I’ve yet to see a poly tape I’d spend money on. Most are of modest quality and a couple of years in the sun and the weather will do for them.
Electrobraid would be, and has been, my choice. It is of good quality and handles weather quite well. I’ve never had an injury with it and that may be because I ensure it’s put up correctly and stays reasonably taut.
There are many possible alternatives. Spend some time at a couple of retail vendors and put you hands on the product. Or see if an internet vendor will send you a sample. That way you’ll know what your are buying.
Good luck in your choice.
G.
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Here, tape is useless because of our wind, that beats tape to death in short time.
You may not have that problem if your paddocks are where they are somewhat protected from continuous strong winds like we have here.
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I’m still very new at this … boarded for 4 years at a place that had what I now know to be Horse Guard. I bought Dare tape thinking it would be the same/similar. The Dare stuff feels very flimsy and in just a few months I’ve noticed stretching and wear from just wind and weather.
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That is what I was worried about. Horseguard seems much better than the other stuff. No point in saving a little money now if I’ll just have to replace it in a couple years
Horseguard is so much better than the other stuff. I have had it up for 17 years and it still looks great. It was one of the best purchases I have made. Easy to install, easy to maintain, easy to repair, and safe for horses.
Just driving by other farms using tape, the tape gets a lot of wind pushing it. Seems to stretch more, sag more when the wind stops. It also holds a LOT of ice when you get freezing rain, can about pull it off the posts! You know your weather, what your fence will be dealing with.
We have real wire fences, not had to deal with plastic tape or rope fencing.
Sorry G, have to disagree with you. I had 20 year old tape and only replaced it because the posts and top boards needed replacing. I put more tape up and love the stuff. It bends and stretches a bit, a tree fell on it and broke the top boards but once we got the tree up it sprang back up. But it’s not super stretchy where it would “snap back” if a horse went through it. It’s more like slightly stretchy ribbon - if you cut it, it just falls to the ground. The horses really respect it and stay off it.
I think you need to install it right, I’ve been past places where it’s sagged and looks awful; mine was done by pros and looks just fine. Nice straight lines, no sagging.
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I agree with Palm Beach that tape needs to be installed correctly, and maintained correctly. 90% of the places I have been to or drive past that are using tape are doing it WRONG and it looks like crap.
I have used off brand 1.5" poly tape and Horse Guard. Horse Guard is by far the better product. It is MUCH sturdier, yet lets the wind blow thru. My HG tape does not move in the wind, even a tornado in Oklahoma did not take it down. All the other “off” brands DO catch the wind like a sail, and you do have to tighten them back up a bit after a good windstorm. Tightening is not hard if the fence has been installed correctly. Literally about a 10-second job with your hands, just pulling the slack thru the end or corner insulators.
I have also used 1/2" tape, only because it was left behind at the home I purchased and the barn I work at. It SUCKS. It is pointless. It doesn’t have the visibility of the 1.5" tape and there is not proper hardware out there to install it right.
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OP… since you are currently selling the other products I suggest you contact a manufacturer of the horseguard polytape fencing that you like to see if they would sell you at direct a sample lot at standard distributor pricing for your personal testing?
I used to work outside sales for several manufacturers and was always at least interested in looking at new outlets for our products
Another vote for Horseguard. I’m on year 11 with my original round of tape, it’s held up beautifully. It does need to be tightened after heavy snow/wind and I annually replace a few tensioners. But I’m a one person maintenance crew and I wouldn’t have anything else, so easy to maintain/fix/install. I’ve had a horse go through it and all it did was pull through the tensioners. No injuries. Everyone but that one horse, that one time, respects it. Definitely other brands do not perform the same.
When I worked at another barn that had polyrope, when a horse tried to go through it he got tangled and the rope cut through his flesh from stifle to pastern, looked like he went through a spiralizer. That was all I needed to know about using rope.
I’ve been thinking about this too. I’m pretty sure they only sell direct to consumer but doesn’t hurt to check.
I like the electrobraid. My parents installed it at their farm 10 years ago. It was easy to do themselves, and they’ve only had to tighten it a couple times to keep it looking sharp.
It has better visibility then they thought it would. The horses have never come close to going through it, and they’re out at night in the summer. The back 10 acres has 3 strands for the horses. The front 15 is fenced with pagewire and two strands of electrobraid for the summer steers. Deer and moose are in and out of those fields all the time and have never gotten caught on the fence. The bears are smart enough to know when the fence is on or not, they like the patch of clover that grows in the one corner.
Because it was easy for them to do themselves they’ve also changed the paddocks a little and didn’t have to call anyone in to help.
It’s been about 15 years since I’ve boarded or spent any time at a place that used the tape. At that time the tape never seemed to stand up for more then a year or two. By the posts on this thread it sounds like it’s gotten better.
The one other thing I will say about fencing is that I strongly believe that any paddock under an acre should have a highly visible board at the top, and 4 or 5 strands of electric of some sort to keep the horses from sticking heads and feet through the fence. And the electric should always be on when the horses are out.
I’ve seen horses get injured in small paddocks, either because they didn’t respect the fence, or they got running and slid through it. The worst one I saw was a horse that got his leg through a pipe corral. That one still gives me nightmares. I’ve never seen a horse have a fence injury when turned out in a big field with room to run and stay away from the fences, and room to get away from the other horses.
We have a pretty small paddock area. Only an acre split in two but hoping to expand it to have a 3rd half acre section. They currently respect the fence because I had to add electric on the inside because my donkey kept escaping. Its just one horse and donkey and they are always together. I know neither of them will try to run through it and won’t stick their heads through because they already respect the single line of electric I have up.
Piling on to the Horseguard bandwagon as well. Ours is 15 year old this Spring. The longest span - 1000’ or so - is unprotected from winds, and is a high spot along this section of land. It’s been through more than a few tropical storms, depressions, terrifying thunderstorms, Spring winds, and that section is no worse for the wear than the sections well-sheltered by trees.
You MUST space posts no more than 16’ apart - just put them a little closer if wind is a concern. Ours are 15’ apart. Maybe 14 - it’s been a while.
The tape doesn’t degrade. It still looks as good as it did the day we installed it. What does degrade is the plastic insulators, but that’s no biggie. Replacing them is so much cheaper and faster than replacing board fence, and replacement just isn’t a common thing.
I’ve had a horse bounce off it when being silly and running into it (ok, it was a newly OTTB mare who was being a little excited). I have 1 horse who has rolled into it not once but twice. The first time he got a strand wrapped around a leg, ran, broke insulators, and the tape - not his leg - broke when the tape hit the tensioner. Easy peasy fix for the fence, his leg was just a little abraded with some “rope burn” oozing for a few days and that was that. The 2nd time, he just broke a few fence posts and walked away.
There is tape, and there is Horseguard. Other tape just doesn’t have the quality that HG does.
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Horseguard is the way to go. Cheaper tapes just won’t hold up. The wires in them are what don’t hold up.
Tape on wood posts seems to work pretty well here. I’ve seen cord get broken by the horses more easily (mine has snapped 3 just playing…and it’s not like he enjoys being shocked. Tape he respects unless it’s turned off then it might go in his mouth). I also like the increased visual aspect of tape. I think I’d use cord only as a hot line on some kind of solid fence. Wood fencing is my preference but if I had to do things differently, tape on wood posts would be the way to go. As for brands, though, I don’t have experience distinguishing.
Do not under any circumstances get black rope. I used it to divide my pastures for rotation and my horses went through it multiple times at night, even after tying neon flags every 6’. One ended up with pretty severe rope burn from it. After that, I switched to white tape and haven’t had a problem since.
Correctly installed and maintained tape will last. :yes:
Like other posters, I’ve also seen some pretty horrific electric rope injuries. It would not be my first choice if there are other alternatives that will work for the situation.
