Agatha the Excavator

My favorite part of owning a little hobby farm is finding creative (cheap) solutions to the challenges that come up.   The challenge facing us this year is that we want to clear another acre of woods down.  We can't afford excavating equiptment but we do have a hungry pig.

 It is unbelievable how destructive she is.  That destructive nature may as well be put to good use.

We got a solar powered fence charger.  There was some initial cost but it can be used to fence any of our critters in (or out) so it will get lots of use.

I wanted to get pictures of us setting it up but it was so fast and easy there isn't much to show and we were racing against rain.  I know, shocker.

Here she is in her new place clearing our first patch for us.  I should have taken a before picture, by the time I got down to take the picture the morning after she had already turned over most of the sod around the edges and trampled about half the vines down.  We hired the right girl for the job! :)

Clearly this wasn't Agatha's first exposure to electric fence!  She leaves 2 inches or more between herself and the fence at all times.

Unfortunately the baby goat and the dog had to learn the hard way.

Did you know:

Pigs are easy to control with electric fences due to their thin hair and large wet noses.  They learn very quickly and will respect the wire after just one or two lessons.  However, they will sometimes use the fence when they fight by pushing each other into it.