best fence for cattle/orchard boundary?

[Rhedyn]

Hiya I'm looking for advice on fencing the boundary between my orchard and my neighbour's cattle. We get on very well and organise fencing together and share costs, so this is a negotiation not a dispute. In this case he is pushing for the usual sheep stock fence with 1 strand barb plus electric, I think because it seems easier to him if everything is standard plus he has gotten used to relying on electric as the way to do things.

My preference is to do something different for this boundary because 1) it's only about 60m, 2) on my side it's fairly tight quarters for orchard and polytunnel and I don't want to bump myself into electric or lots of barb, 3) my side looks really attractive to bored youngstock cattle who are overly tame and get excited whenever they see a human carrying a sack. And also 4) my feeling is electric + cattle works 90% of the time but here I want something for 100% of the time and I'm happy to pay for it.

Any advice? I can hire separate to do just this boundary if I need to, we usually just organise together so we both have control over machinery on our land and when fences are down etc.

 

[Tarw Coch]

Keeping it fairly agricultural I’d make use of rails.
You could use a top rail over netting instead of the barb, you could put additional rails below the barb as well or do without the netting and just use rails.
You could also put a secondary fence just out from the main fence of a single or double row of barb to keep pressure off the main fence or use an electric fence for the secondary fence.

 

[Rhedyn]

Diolch I was wondering about rails over netting. What height and post diameter would you think?

 

[Tarw Coch]

Minimum of 4 foot high I would say, should be more than sufficient for quiet young stock, without barb on top they are more likely to rub against it so you will either need a secondary fence to keep them back or stronger posts to hold.

 

[JohnGalway]

3 ft sheep netting plus barbed plus electric would be my thoughts too. Could offset the electric on his side if you're worried about that, wouldn't be a big cost on just 60 meters. But the barbed will save the sheep net which the cattle will crush down if they get the opportunity. If you really want to do the dog on it you could add a second line of barbed plus use more than one line of offset electric, provided it's got a good solid bang off it. Unless the stock on his side are being starved I don't think they'd bother. Might start looking a little like East German border at that stage

 

[Rhedyn]

We've had a few episodes of the cattle crushing down barb and going through electric -- it's the few months this time of year when they are teenage steers and have some size and muscle and a taste for adventure that is the problem, it only takes a few ringleaders with a high pain tolerance to lead the way. So I'm inclined toward a big strong physical barrier if I can get one, and then maybe layer additional deterrents offset onto my neighbour's side? And avoiding the full East German border option