separating buck pens

Tom, 10' should be enough. They will walk the fence and get all cocky with each other when the velvet comes off, but they shouldn't try fighting. I've never used less than that, though.

Tom,

Just remember to think what you would like to do in the future. By maybe being able to drive a vehicle or back a trailer down your runway. To load and unlaod deer. When you get snow that 10' shrinks fast when you plow. Mine are 12' that way I can do all of this and still use my 12' gates in pens and runways. As always....Just what works for me.

One thing I would recommend is not having a straight alley, if you can make it work. It seems like deer move easier if you can push them around a corner or a curve so that there appears to be fence between you and them, or better yet, if you are making solid no-see fence in your alley, they can't even see you when they get around the corner.

I have six pens and started with 12 food alleys. My last two i went to 20 foot alleys so it is easier to get tractors and skid steers around corners. It is a bit more of a hassle to gate off when moving deer down the alleys from pen to pen. We fasten a short roll of wire we use to roll out and close off alleys instead of gates like we did with the 12 food alleys. Our next pens will also have 20 foot alleys. We found that making the corner where the gate is works really nice if you put the gate at a 45 degree angle when you have alleys between pens.

What I have done on short fence runs is to take used steel roofing and wire it to fence that divides bucks. I lift it about a foot or more off the ground as they can't fight if they can't get eye contact and to see over they have to lift their head all the way up. Can't fight on tip toes either. Saves a lot on double fencing and works well. Funny to watch two bucks trying to get a look at another one looking up and down .....no fights to report. Jim

Tom, what we have has really worked good for testing deer, moving deer, or just letting them out to walk around. We also use a 12'' alleyway and when we have two pens back to back we build a 8' high fence out of 1''x8'' boards. This really works good they cant see through it and can't fight through it. When you compare the price of the lumber to fence it is not that much more.