Lorenzo Costa wrote:I have been thinking about this aspect to for quite a time now. I have 3.5 hectares where there are a lot of deers and wild boars. they both are a real big problem. the rest of my land is a woodland of another 2.6 hectares that I will leave free to range for them and has one boundary made up by a yearlong creek. It's to down the hill to use water and I like sort like zone 5 stuff so I'll not speak about fencing it.
the 3.5 hectares are my burden. I've been on to living fences, and hedgelaying there are threads on this, here's one, just to have more ideas: https://permies.com/t/1437/woodland/Planning-growing-hedge-living-fence
I'v been putting together some numbers, if I fence out the 3.6 hectares, knowing that on side it's already fenced by my neighbor I'll work, let's say one month and probably have a fence for the next thirty years, using what we usually use as poles for fences, chestnut poles. ,
If I put a living fence I'll have to: first, plant all the tree's protecting them form the deers and the boars that sort of love to flip everything around if they don't like to eat it; then wait three or four years to have a benefit from the growing hedge.
I read this book on hedges: Murray Maclean, Hedges and Hedgelaying, the title was recommended on the thread I highlighted before, and there is a good table showing how many plants one should use it goes from 1 metre length hedge to 1 km, and from 6 inch spacing in between plants to 36 inch depending on plant growing space: so for a 655 metre hedge with 12 inch spacing the author calculates 2,182 plants
for the plants he considers a lot of varieties, because what he insists on is the importance even of wildlife conservation, as birds or small mammals, and I agree with his vision. we have to think of the hedge as an exlcuding barrier but even a wildlife housing and food feature.
Hawthorn should be not less than 60% of the plants variety beacuse it has a quick growth, then he speaks a lot of blackthorn, dog rose, field maple, hazel, if we speak of small trees or shrubs. if one wants tu use tree's the spacing is more and the time to wait to have a close hedge is longer. I would think of two more that in the book the author doesn't list: black locust, and Osage Orange quick growing and full of thornes, one could put them mixed with other plants and shrubs.
I like the idea of having yields for the deers on the hedge so they don't get to want to cross the hedge. Hedgelaying is another possibility to work quick and fast but you always get to wait three or four years. the hedge though gets thicker, even though there is maintenance to do every three or four years depends on what you want and how high. I think I'll end up fencing my plot though I will try to fencing with poles in a classic way and establish my living fence behind the day I have my poles rotting and want to take them off I'll have a living fence behind at least it will establish well and be stable for the moment it will have to be useful. the small birds and mammals will benefit from the hedge that grows even if there is a fence so I will give anyway a yield to someone.
the big point is the time we have and what we harvest form our plots.
Riona Abhainn wrote:
I think if you could get some thick hedges going then it could help with keeping the hungry deer and boars out, they can nibble on the edges without going too far in? I'm not an expert on this by any means. Another thing to consider is that if you get to know your new neighbours and they learn more about how glad you are to be there, maybe they will see that you're a nice neighbour and won't have strong negative opinions about changes you make, because they know you're excited about rural life.
Hugo Morvan wrote:
Jealous making property sir.
That's a great way of fencing, but deer jump very high. Any wolve packs around?
Nancy Reading wrote:Hi Remy - Thankyou for sharing your lovely property with us. It looks beautiful with so much potential. I think you are wise to not have livestock if you are not there to care for them. Maybe in time you will find someone locally that can come when you are absent, but it is one less thing to worry about in the mean time.
As regards wildlife coming and eating your crops...what would Sepp do? He does use fencing, but also https://permies.com/w/bundlelets trees grow naturally and accepts the browsing of the deer and bunnies. I'm not sure he has boar though, they can be a real challenge I gather. I think I would maybe consider fencing a smaller area with non electric fencing around the vegetable patch, or even electric fencing (given your lack of mature trees to harvest for posts perhaps). I wonder whether the boar could be given access to parts to help with cultivation like you might chickens or pigs? Just throwing ideas at random here. I know how much damage just a field vole can do to a row of peas, so don't want to take the issue lightly.
Have you looked at syntropic agriculture at all? I quite like the idea, but still have a feeling it suits a warmer climate than I have here, but may be worth you considering. It is basically planting all your succession plants at once, allowing survival of the fittest and chop and drop at maturity to avoid senesence, creating lots of biomass. We have a thread here about it as a starting point.
I'm really looking forwards to seeing how your farm develops.
Anne Miller wrote:I read that you were not going to have a pond so it would be great to catch all that rainwater off your roof.
Here is one guys approach:
https://permies.com/t/76631/Waynes-rainwater-harvest-start-finish