4-Board Fence my Norwood Built.

Planman1954 · January 25, 2011, 02:01:50 PM

Hello Again:

I thought I would start a thread on my lastest adventure into country life....a 4 board barnyard fence for the goats. It is for the rear of the barn I've been building the last year+. I wanted to go ahead and build it now, since the poor goats have to stay in a small yard at the present time. The barn had to wait a while, but it was out of the weather after the wood shingles were on.

Anyway, the fence needed to be a good height since goats can jump fairly high. I decided to go with 1"x8" boards with 6" between them. I think that works out to close to 5' high with the finished product.

I started with 4"x6"x8' long stock (All SYP.) I let them soak in preservative for a few days:

Then after figuring out where the fence would run, (I had a lot of ravines and land slope to deal with) I started digging post holes by hand about 24" deep, and setting the pre-painted posts. The spacing was about 7'-8" center to center:

The next step was to attach the pre-painted 1"x8" boards to the posts. I used 2 1/2" screws instead of nailing them. The screws will NOT let go as nails do. Trust me on this. I had to tear down an old one built a few years ago. And another big reason to use screws...If a fence board or post rots or fails, it takes about 5 minutes to put another one on. Here's a photo of the boards on the posts:

The next step was to cut off the post tops level with a chainsaw. I went about 3 inches above the top board and made a cut. Next, a put a pre-painted 1"x6" trim board over the exposed joints on each post to make a better finished look. And finally, I screwed on a cap board to protect the exposed top of the posts..about an 8"x8" x 1 1/2" piece. Here's some photos of the finished fence going through the "jungle":

I mounted boards onto an aluminum gate I had to allow for tractor access to the yard:

I'm not quite finished with the rear run of the fence yet, and I have a few gates to build. Here's a few pictures of the fence I took from the second floor of the barn looking to the side and rear:

And finally, here's a picture of the fence crossing over a drainage ditch for our road out front. I connected it with 1"x6"s on both sides as you can hopefully see in the picture. That helped me get a better look by keeping the top level. Hope the goats will stay inside!

I think the total cost of the fence is about $250.00 for paint and $30.00 for screws. And I'll just betcha that having something like that built around here would run 5 grand or so. That's why I encouraged Andy a day to two ago to go ahead and get him a mill. You'll keep coming up with new projects to build....I think I have about 5 or 6 down the road .....

Take care.

isawlogs · January 25, 2011, 02:21:02 PM

That is really a nice fence, when you going to let the goats out so you can get a pic of one standing on one of the post ;D

sandhills · January 25, 2011, 02:44:46 PM

I was going to remind you that goats not only jump, but they can climb also, Marcel took care of that

That is a beautiful fence (and barn) if you ever get bored and nothing to do come on over and start on mine :D.

Patty · January 25, 2011, 03:19:48 PM

Wow, very nice P-man. How many goats do you have? Do you milk them, or are they just for fun?

Planman1954 · January 25, 2011, 03:35:59 PM

They definitely ain't for fun...too much trouble!! We use them for goat milk. Nubians mostly, but we have one Alpine. The Alpines are a little more apt to jump than the Nubians. The Nubian milk is better and easier to milk. I know there are always comments about goats and jumping. But we've had them long enough (and so has my buddy Jimmy down the road) that I'm fairly confident they won't be able to get over this fence. We've used this type fence around here for over 3 years now. We have 4 goats...one Alpine and 3 Nubians. One of the Nubians is a billy.
Goat milk is good for you! Over 2/3 of the world drinks it...not cow milk. And let me tell you...it'll clean out your system the first couple of weeks you drink it!

It doesn't have the fat globules that cow milk does, and babies can tolerate it when they cannot drink cow milk. It cannot be sold here though. Laws vary state to state. So we have our own.
Here's a photo of one of our (deceased now) Nubians with her 2 babies. The black young one is about to have her own babies in about a month.

Wrangler55 · January 25, 2011, 03:41:20 PM

Quote from: Patty on January 25, 2011, 03:19:48 PM
Wow, very nice P-man. How many goats do you have? Do you milk them, or are they just for fun?

The goats are for exercise... He's got to catch them before he can milk them. After he gets enough exercise chasing goats, he can put a couple of strands of electric fence on the inside of the boards so he won't have to chase the ones that have climbed out.

Hal

Planman1954 · January 25, 2011, 03:50:25 PM

Very funny Hal!! Actually though, you don't have to chase them...they will chase YOU if they see a feed bucket in your hand!

Tom · January 25, 2011, 04:23:08 PM

One of my old-timer friends asked me the question, "Tom, do you know how to keep a goat from jumping over a fence?"

"No, how do you do it?"

"You lean a board up against the fence and he'll walk over it." ;D

Magicman · January 25, 2011, 06:59:16 PM

With their new fence, those are some real uptown country goats.

Bill Gaiche · January 25, 2011, 08:05:33 PM

Planman1954,Nice fence. Those have to be some very lucky goats. They proably have the best fence in your part of the parish. bg

Chuck White · January 26, 2011, 05:38:09 AM

Nice looking fence.

Wrangler55 · January 26, 2011, 05:40:37 AM

Quote from: Planman1954 on January 25, 2011, 03:50:25 PM
Very funny Hal!! Actually though, you don't have to chase them...they will chase YOU if they see a feed bucket in your hand!

I couldn't help myself...

I grew up on a farm and we had cows, goats, pigs, chickens, geese, horses, mules, etc... What we didn't have was a fence as nice as yours, so I got to round up whatever got loose. Any new babies that we were going to keep got fed from an old red pail. Any time you shook some loose corn in the bucket, everything in sight would come running. It sure beat chasing some crazy calf or pig all over the countryside.

Hal

thecfarm · January 26, 2011, 08:57:20 AM

Wow,nice looking fence.I just used slabs to keep my goats in.I never had a problem with them climbing,jumping over the fence.But they was well fed and we payed attention to them.Had 8 goats over the years.Most of ours would follow us just like a dog.

Burlkraft · January 26, 2011, 10:37:21 AM

Very nice fence ;) ;)

We gotta stop posting the DanG goat pictures tho.......

Between you and Marcel I'm not going to be able to stop Jill from gittin' some :

:

And ya know who will end up takin' care of 'em

Jeff · January 26, 2011, 12:18:43 PM

Link For Steve: [lmgtfy]Wisconsin Goat Breeders[/lmgtfy]

ErikC · January 26, 2011, 12:39:35 PM

If you make that fence a little bigger, you won't have all that jungle in the ravine. The gots will slick it right up for you. We drank goats milk when I was a kid. I liked it, but I like fresh cows milk better. I think the fat globules go better with Kahlua.... ;D

jim king · January 26, 2011, 01:00:00 PM

That is one nice fence anywhere in the world.

Magicman · January 26, 2011, 04:57:39 PM

Back in the early 60's before we got deer and wild dogs, we had herds of wild goats. We would take our 22 and hunt them. Thankfully, they were white so you could see them. It was a good day when you could bring home a young kid.

Planman1954 · January 26, 2011, 06:01:47 PM

Thanks for reading and all the nice comments! I never knew it would end up being a thread about goats. :D

I guess it will turn to food now that Magicman brought up goat meat!

ErikC · January 26, 2011, 06:47:41 PM

As you know, it's only a matter of time. :D

Magicman · January 26, 2011, 09:00:39 PM

We had goats to hunt, but we didn't have any pretty fences. Come to think about it, we didn't have a Norwood either.

fishpharmer · January 26, 2011, 09:08:34 PM

Nice fence planman and nice goats. 8)

I had a goat when I was a kid.

Lived in my mama's flower bed.

Didn't have it long. :D

loghog1717 · November 15, 2012, 08:16:31 AM

I am so impressed with the small details that make this fence look so good! Great job Planman1954! Keep on posting! We learn so much from you!

grweldon · November 15, 2012, 04:53:14 PM

Planman, how many linear feet of fence did you build and how much area did you enclose. Way back in the seldom visited recesses of my mind, I have the idea that I will one day have a few goats to take care of my Chinese Privet. Just looking for a relative size comparison...

Planman1954 · November 15, 2012, 08:05:21 PM

Grweldon: The fence I built was an area probably 100' x60'. If your're going to have more than 2 or 3 goats, you'll need a lot bigger. That is, unless you feed them hay everyday. As I recall (I no longer have goats) the goats could clean out that whole area in a few weeks. We only had a few for the milk.