Post by Pam on Oct 18, 2013 15:51:06 GMT -5
So the night before last I forgot to close the door to the hen house and we lost 11 hens (that I've found, at least). I think it was probably dogs because they didn't eat them, just left them all over the yard for me to find in the morning. Anyways, in addition to setting the alarm on my phone so I won't forget to close the door again, I decided to give whoever it was a nice surprise if they come back by stringing four strands of electric around the hen house and adjacent yard. Anyways, in the process, I found the fence I was hooking it up to wasn't working very well. So I spent all day today trying to figure out why.
First I thought maybe I had too much on the fencer because it's running three fences already and it's pretty small. So I got out a bigger one, hooked it up, no difference. So the next step is to check the ground. Nine out of ten times when there's not enough power to an electric fence, it's the ground. I only had one ground rod for this particular charger and you technically should have three. So I spent quite a good amount of time trying to find a place where I could drive in two more. If you know the name of my farm (Damrock Farm) you will understand that this is NOT an easy task. I was finally able to get them driven in and hooked up properly. No difference. GRRRR!!
I knew it wasn't weeds sapping the power because I just weed-whacked on Wednesday. So I took a stroll around the fence and lo and behold, I found two broken insulators which were letting the wire touch the fenceposts, very effectively grounding it in two places. DUH! It would have been much easier to walk around the fence FIRST, but that would have made too much sense. I replaced the insulators and now it works.
Oh, word of advice. DON'T touch the fence now. I think it would knock a pissed off bull on his a$$! Yeeeahhhhh, at least the extra two ground rods were good for something.
First I thought maybe I had too much on the fencer because it's running three fences already and it's pretty small. So I got out a bigger one, hooked it up, no difference. So the next step is to check the ground. Nine out of ten times when there's not enough power to an electric fence, it's the ground. I only had one ground rod for this particular charger and you technically should have three. So I spent quite a good amount of time trying to find a place where I could drive in two more. If you know the name of my farm (Damrock Farm) you will understand that this is NOT an easy task. I was finally able to get them driven in and hooked up properly. No difference. GRRRR!!
I knew it wasn't weeds sapping the power because I just weed-whacked on Wednesday. So I took a stroll around the fence and lo and behold, I found two broken insulators which were letting the wire touch the fenceposts, very effectively grounding it in two places. DUH! It would have been much easier to walk around the fence FIRST, but that would have made too much sense. I replaced the insulators and now it works.
Oh, word of advice. DON'T touch the fence now. I think it would knock a pissed off bull on his a$$! Yeeeahhhhh, at least the extra two ground rods were good for something.
It will serve them right. I hate owners who let their dogs run free at anytime. Don't mean on their own land but just running loose.
