The electric fence to separate the sheep from HA’s newly-planted botanicals is working well. We’ve had lots of rain, though, and grass around the fence is growing up fast in spite of the fact that we cleared it completely two weeks ago when we put up the fence. I was worried that the fence was completely grounded out by contact with wet grass, so I got an electric fence tester. Today was a dry day (nice!) so I put the tester to use. I figured we should be getting around 5 kV to make it effective, but the meter showed only 1.5 kV.
I got that particular tester because it had an LCD display which should be (and is) visible in direct sun. There are cheaper testers that use neon bulbs, but I was afraid those would be too hard to read in the sunlight. Trying to balance the meter, its ground probe, and a hand to shade the display while standing over an energized fence seemed like a recipe for a shocking disaster.
We cleared under the fence with a string trimmer. It’s a two-person job: one holds up the (de-energized!!) fence while the other trims under it, taking care not to let the string trimmer grab a piece of the fence netting and wind it tightly around the spool. Oh, no, I would never let such a thing happen because I would then have had to spend half an hour unspooling it. Otherwise, it didn’t take too long and the fence voltage went up from 1.5 kV to 6.6 kV.
BTW, it’s nowhere near a lethal jolt. I even saw Vinda walk warily up to the fence and gingerly touch his nose to it. He quickly backed off with a “nope, I wasn’t just imagining it” look on his face. It soon becomes much more of a psychological barrier, and they just avoid touching it whether it’s energized or not.
There are also a couple of Yellow Tebebuia (“golden trumpet”) trees on the sheep side of the fence. HA planted them last year, and we thought they were probably big enough to withstand the attentions of Vinda, Lu, and Naan. Alas, no. The sheep stripped all the lower leaves, and then started peeling the bark. We were worried that they’d girdle the expensive young trees, so we put cages around them.
—2p