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Select The Best Fence Design For Your Site—


Let Premier help decide which fence is best for you. Simply select the "Fencing" tab in the left hand column to help you decide which fence can be used to keep your goats in or out.



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Fence Solutions for Goats—



Temporary…


    Boundary sites?


    Electrified netting is the best temporary boundary fence. Why? Because it stops sheep, goats, dogs and most coyotes.
    Specific suggestions:
    • Use 35" ElectroNet® or E’Net™ only if animals are trained to netting and are neither tall nor flighty. It’s less $$ and easier to use than other netting.
    • Use the taller ElectroStop®, E’Stop™ or ElectroFence™ for flighty animals.

    Internal sites?

    • Netting is the quickest to install and/or remove. It’s also more reliable but more expensive per ft to purchase.
    • Or use 2 strands of IntelliTape™ or 3 strands of IntelliTwine on reels. Much cheaper per ft than netting but more labor to install. It will stop most adult ewes and feeder lambs. But it will not stop coyotes, dogs, young lambs/kids, goats, hungry sheep or rams/billies during the breeding season.



Semi-permanent…

  • PermaNet®. Faster to install and remove than 4-5 strand fences. More expensive but more reliable. PermaNet must be electrified.
  • Or use 5-strand multi-strand fences. Less expensive but less reliable than PermaNet.



Permanent options…


In our experience the following design has been reliable and cost effective:
  1. One GreenCote barbed wire 1"–2" above the soil to deter guard dogs and coyotes from digging out/in.
  2. Above that GreenCote® HT woven wire 8/32/9 or similar. For 8/32/9 add 2 non-energized HT wires to produce a fence that’s 45"–48" tall.
  3. Wood or steel line posts no more than 25 ft apart. All corner/end posts must be wood and well-braced.
  4. One or 2 “live” wires or ropes offset on the grazed side. We find that offset strands at 7­" and 30" will stop lambs, kids, adult sheep/goats and most of their predators. This combination forms a reliable, maintenance-free, aesthetic barrier that keeps nearly all guard dogs and livestock in and coyotes out.

    Subdivision sites?

    • Same design as for boundary fences.
    • Or use only 7 or 8 smooth HT wires of which 2 are off-set and energized. Much less $$ but also less reliable.

    Barbed wire fences?


    A Boer goat producer from Utah reported success in dry sites with fences made of 6 to 8 strands of GreenCote barbed wire (it has very nasty barbs) attached to wood or steel posts.
    We tested this design at Premier. It’s expensive but it absolutely stops dogs, coyotes, cattle, sheep, goats and most hunters. Don’t let horses near it!

    Floodplain sites?


    We use a 5-strand fence composed of:
    1. IntelliRope™ 4.5 below the normal high water level.
    2. HT smooth wire above that.
    3. Wood line posts. (Wood posts resist the side pressure created by floods better than steel or fiberglass.) The flood will break the IntelliRope and leave the posts and upper HT wires in place. It’s easy to refit the IntelliRope.



Water gaps…

  • Old or damaged electrified netting supported by extra FiberRods. Each flood will further degrade it.
  • Or install up to 4 strands of “live” tape/twine on 1/2" fiberglass rods. This is much cheaper than net, less likely to tangle and easily repaired—but less reliable against creative animals.



Field gates…

  • Temporary gates? Use NetGate™ 3.0. Repels coyotes and dogs as well as livestock. Can be adapted to any length. Low-cost. Easy to install.
  • For more permanent gates Premier’s 4 ft tall welded wire panels (though some guard dogs crawl over them).
  • For electrified netting fences just remove an end post and pull the net back to let animals/machines in/out.



To Reduce Risk and Liability…


Are electric fences a serious safety risk to humans?


Because touching an electric fence leaves a vivid and painful memory and the voltages are also high, most assume that the risk to life and limb must also be high. In fact, the opposite is true. Consider that hundreds of thousands of people throughout the world are “exposed” to the millions of electric fences every day—yet electric fences account for (but are not always the cause of) less than one human death or serious injury per year worldwide. Compare that to the number of annual injuries and deaths that occur from human exposure to tractors, skid loaders, ladders, PTO shafts, balers, mowers, combines, bulls, stallions, shotguns, knives, etc. This is not to suggest that there is no risk. There is, indeed, a small level of risk. And with risk, there is also liability to the fence’s owner.

What NOT to do!

  • Never place your head near an electrified wire. Accidental head or neck contact can occur when pushing a voltage probe into the soil or when checking voltage. Be very careful when you do so to avoid head-to-wire contact!
  • Never allow anyone else to touch a modern electric fence. It is not a game!
  • Instruct all visitors and children to never touch electric fencing.

Warning: In 1991 an accidental fatality occurred when a young child’s head contacted an electrified fence while the child was crawling on wet grass. The fence was correctly installed and functioning properly. The energizer was a UL approved unit. As a result, Premier strongly advises against allowing toddlers access to any electrified fences. Also, due to this incident and others, experts now suggest that human contact by an energized wire to the head and neck may be the most dangerous point of contact. We urge all to especially avoid this kind of contact.