Sheep fence

Sheep are amongst the more difficult animals to keep. The thick wool on sheep is an extremely poor electrical conductor.

Choosing an electric fence

Depending on the purpose of your fence, an electric fence with 4–5 rows or electric netting is recommended.

With permanent installations and alternating pastures we recommend setting up an electric fence with 4–5 rows of polywire or wire.

For more flexible usage and where pastures are constantly changing, electric netting is a suitable option for keeping sheep. Electric netting is quick and easy to put up, prevents lambs from slipping through and is also excellent value for money.

Warning:
electric netting is not suitable for horned animals. (Danger of getting caught up in the netting)

Electric fences

Fence height

The rows in the electric fence should be set at heights of around 30 cm, 45 cm, 65 cm and 90 cm.

Fence posts

Place fence posts every 4–5 m. Robust plastic posts make excellent mobile fence posts and line posts. These are easy to install, inexpensive and versatile. We recommend the high-quality "Limit 110" electric fence post, item no. 42171. To ensure sufficient stability in your fence system you should place solid wooden or metal posts at corners and gates. The Allround metal posts, item no. 44386  or our Octo-Wood wooden posts are particularly good choices (e.g. item no. 44825.9).

Conducting materials

To ensure that a sheep makes sufficient skin contact with the electric fence even through its thick wool, electric fence polywire or galvanised wire with a high conductivity should preferably be used. Broad electric tape is not suitable, as this cannot easily get through the dense insulating fur.

Electric polywire is particularly simple to handle and is long-lasting. The quality of the wire used should be matched with the length of the fence. For simple medium-length fences, electric fence polywire item 44613 with a resistance of 3.45 ohm/m is best suited. It has 7 rust-proof high-grade steel conductors running through it and is extremely tough.

For longer fences, an even more high-quality wire with an even lower resistance is required. Low quality rope will mean that a large amount of voltage is lost over the longer distance, leaving insufficient voltage at the end of the fence. We recommend our highly conductive HPC series electric fence polywire.

Stranded wire is extremely tough, highly conductive and good value. Galvanised stranded wire (item no. 44558) has good conductivity and is also suitable for long fences.

The monowire (item no. 44544) brings together the benefits of stranded wire and polywire. Like stranded wire, monowire has a high conductivity at a low cost. Monowire, however, is easy to handle due to its plastic component and is very durable!

Electric netting

Fence height

An electric fence for sheep should be 90 cm tall and have sufficient conductivity for its length.

Fence posts / conducting materials / electric netting

For short and simple fencing, our orange sheep netting (item no. 27202) with 14 fixed plastic posts is most suitable. The well-known, tried-and-tested Euro netting (item no. 27126) is super simple to put up, is easy to combine with existing fences and has a good enough conductivity for short to medium-length sheep fences.

For longer fences or difficult terrain we recommend the Kombinetz sheep netting, item no. 27193. Its two tips give this electric netting particularly good stability, and vertical struts prevent the netting from sagging. The very good conductivity ensures optimal safety, even over long distances!

Many people are concerned that they cannot get direct access to the pasture without having to turn off the electricity or laying the electric netting down on the ground. Electric-fence.co.uk has the solution to this problem: Using our door for electric netting (item no. 27402) you can very easily and quickly build an electrified access point into your fence. This will give you easy access to the pasture without having to compromise safety.

More stability for the electric netting can be achieved using NetFix supports. These increase the life and safety of the fencing and are ideally suited for using at corners, at the start of the fence and as line supports (item no. 27311). Pega (item no. 27233) are used to fix the sheep netting securely to the ground.

Energisers

Sheep wool is a excellent electrical insulator. To ensure that the animal will notice that they have touched the electric fence, it is essential to use a powerful energiser with a high output voltage and a power discharge energy (min. 2.5 joules)!

If you are unable to use a mains-powered energiser, then a powerful 12 V high-voltage and high-impulse battery unit is recommended. A powerful energiser is particularly important when using fence netting. High-grade steel conductors are generally used in netting to give it the necessary rigidity, but this is not as good a conductor as, e.g. copper polywire.

230 V electric fence mains energiser

Mains energisers are available in different performance categories. Even for long fences with a lot of vegetation and animals that are difficult to keep, these will provide sufficient energy and are therefore also suitable for complex fences. A very reliable and versatile energiser for sheep is the VOSS.farming Tesla 7 (item no. 43825). This is also suitable for use with electric netting and has an excellent price-performance ratio.

Where the demands are particularly high, the Nvi 9000 (item no. 44869) is the best choice. This is also suitable for the most difficult fence and soil conditions, improves performance in the presence of vegetation and has an alarm mode. Even very long stretches of fence are no issue for this energiser!

Recommendation:
install a ground fault circuit breaker before your electric fence's mains energiser to prevent electrical accidents (item no. 48015).

Battery energisers:

If no mains connection is available to you, then you can use a 12 V battery unit. Additional use of solar panels will save time and money and perfectly complements your 12 V battery unit.

A very reliable energiser option is the 12 V VOSS.farming Sirus 8 (item no. 43805). It stands out for its incredible quality, performance and safety and is excellently suited to more difficult fencing. The Avi 10000 (item no. 44687.P) is a 12 V battery energiser with the power of a mains energiser. Designed for long fences and vegetation, it can also deal with the most difficult conditions. The Avi 10000 comes with a digital fence tester included.

A more modern approach makes use of solar panels for powering the electric fence. Using solar panels means you don't need to waste time with frequent battery changes and it is an environmentally friendly, low maintenance and affordable way to power your 12 V energiser.

A complete kit (item no. 43662) that includes the reliable 12 V Green Energy battery energiser, metal case and solar panel is available for a great price. This complete kit is very well suited to smaller fencing systems. Larger fencing systems will need the complete kit containing a 30 W solar system including metal case and powerful Avi 8000 12 V battery energiser (item no. 43667).

Grounding

The grounding for any electric fence system is extremely important. Smooth operation of the electric fence system can only be ensured if the grounding has been carefully installed. You should use galvanised rust-free steel poles with a large surface area to make an optimal electrical contact with the ground. For permanent systems, the 1 m long special grounding post with angled profile, item no. 44219 is ideal. For mobile use, we recommend the practical special grounding post with a round profile, item no. 44375.

The energiser should be connected to at least 1 grounding post using a lead out cable (item no. 33615). More powerful energisers require several (3–5) posts. Where ground conditions are poor (dry, sandy, stony), it may be necessary to use additional grounding posts. Place the grounding posts around 2–3 m from each other and connect them together using a lead out cable (e.g. lead out cable, item no. 33615).

Tip:
the grounding can be checked using a fence tester (item no. 44863). A bypass must first be created. To do this, place iron stakes (or similarly conductive material) into the ground that is in direct contact with the conductive fence materials around 100 m from the energiser. The fence voltage should then drop to around 2000 volts. Now insert the metal rod of the tester into the ground around 1 m from the last grounding post of the energiser and hold the tip of the tester against the grounding post. A reading of 0–200 V indicates that the grounding is good. Voltage readings between 200 and 600 V are within the tolerance range. If you have a value over 600 V it will be necessary to improve the grounding by installing an additional grounding stake in order to ensure sufficient voltage on the fence.

Fence accessories

Connecting cables / connectors

The best conducting material and the most powerful energiser is no use at all if the electrical connections are not properly made.

You should use an electrically conducting fence connection cable to properly connect the energiser to the electric fence. E.g. fence supply cable with heart clip and loop (item no. 44407) or polywire connection cable (item no. 44612) or the fence supply cable for netting (item no. 33614). To properly connect the fence rows to each other use a connection cable with heart clips (item no. 44185) or a strong connection cable with screw clips (item no. 44653).

Use a lead out cable, item no. 33615, to connect the grounding.

Conducting material should never be knotted as this will reduce its conductivity. In the event that your netting, stranded wire or polywire breaks or for attaching it at the start and end of the fence, you should always use electrically conducting connectors such as the electric fence connector, item no. 44684 or item no. 44619.

Lightning protection

Lightning protection equipment is designed to prevent lightning strikes from damaging the energiser. The compact lightning protection (item no. 44755) guides the lightning strike down into the ground and can be easily installed into existing fence system, thus fulfilling the regulations as required by insurers.

Background:
during storms, electric fences are at a quite high risk of being struck by lightning. Without lightning protection, this strike, which can be many millions of volts, travels through the conducting material, via the fence connectors and into the energiser. This energiser is then destroyed. If the energiser is also connected into the mains supply in a stable or similar, the strike can continue into the electricity supply lines and cause an electrical fire in the building. For this reason, regulations forbid the indoor installation of energisers without lightning protection.

Checking / fence tester / fence switch

It is a legal requirement that you conduct regular checks of your electric fence system. A simple check can be done using a fence tester with digital display, item no. 44863.

The SMS alarm device keeps you informed of the status of your fence wherever you are and immediately lets you know if there's a fault! (Item no. 48010)

A fence switch is extremely handy in situations in which the fence requires any repair work. These save you the time of having to make a long walk to the mains energiser to turn it off. The robust green fence switch (item no. 44767) allows you to turn off the voltage to individual sections of fence and safely repair the fault.

Signage

It is a legal requirement that any electric fence systems placed near to public roads and pathways are clearly indicated by a warning sign according. Attach clearly visible warning signs at a recommended interval of 10m to 50m, but not exceeding 90m and at entrances to paths and locations where an electric fence may not be expected carrying the phrase "Electric Fence".(Item no. 44842)