2011 Volume 82 Issue 1 Pages 61-67
We developed a questionnaire to investigate the occurrence of breakouts of grazing cattle from electric fences and thereby determine the factors that could prevent such breakout. The questionnaire was distributed among farmers whose cattle grazed in the small pastures in 3 prefectures (Yamaguchi, Tottori, and Hiroshima). A total of 106 samples were collected, and 83 samples satisfied the criteria for “electric fence” and “Japanese Black breeding cow”. Among the selected respondents, 47% reported occurrences of breakout. Overgrazing was reported to be the major cause of breakout. “Overgrazing” mainly occurred during the late period of grazing ; therefore, cows should be relocated to another pasture at an appropriate time or provided supplemental food. Malfunction of the equipments of electric fence, such as battery, was the second most common cause. This phenomenon mainly occurred during the early and middle periods of grazing. Therefore, it is necessary to check and replace the equipments of electric fence before grazing. We confirmed that increasing the frequency of checks for the electric fence and electricity prevented incidents of breakout.
