Smallholding
Stock fencing quantity and cost
Turns a perimeter into stakes, strainers, rolls and a material cost — counting the strainer posts from the corners and gates, which is the line people leave out and roughly the reason their estimate comes up half.
The question this answers: “What does it actually cost to fence this paddock, and why is the merchant’s number so much bigger than mine?”
Result
- Strainer posts
- 6
- 4 at corners and ends, 2 for 1 gate. The line most often forgotten.
- Intermediate stakes
- 133
- 396.4 m of netted run at 3 m spacing.
- Rolls of netting
- 8
- 50 m rolls, rounded up — 3.6 m spare.
- Material cost
- —
- Enter prices to cost the order.
- Cost per metre
- —
- Compare against your own quotes rather than against a published average.
Worth knowing about this answer
- A materials estimate for ordering, and nothing more. It makes no claim about what fence a given animal needs — netting height, mesh spacing and whether anything is wanted on top are husbandry questions for the supplier and the breed society, not for a calculator.
- Nothing here says a fence may lawfully go where you are drawing it. Boundaries, rights of way and any planning position are separate questions and are not settled by a quantity.
- Labour, bracing timber, staples, tensioners and the tools to strain wire are not costed. On a long run, hired or contracted labour frequently exceeds the materials.
Show the working
- Strainers from the geometry
4 corners and ends + (1 gates × 2)6 - Run needing netting
400 m − 3.6 m of gate opening396.4 m - Intermediate stakes
396.4 ÷ 3 m, rounded up133 - Rolls of netting
396.4 ÷ 50 m, rounded up8 - Material total
£0 stakes + £0 strainers + £0 netting + £0 gates£0
Strainer posts: 6. Intermediate stakes: 133. Rolls of netting: 8. Material cost: —. Cost per metre: —
Strainers are counted from the geometry rather than estimated: one at every corner, end and change of direction, plus two for every gate. Gate openings are taken out of the run at a nominal 3.6 m each, because they need neither netting nor stakes. The remaining run divided by the stake spacing gives the intermediate count, and divided by the roll length and rounded up gives the rolls, since netting is sold in fixed lengths and a run that overshoots still buys a whole one. Each line is priced separately and totalled.
- Stock netting on timber stakes with strained posts at the ends — the standard British paddock fence, and not a post-and-rail, an electric system or a deer fence.
- A nominal 3.6 m per gate opening, which suits a common field gate. A different width changes the netted run slightly and the strainer count not at all.
- Every price is the reader’s own. The tool contributes the counting rather than any figure, because fencing prices move and vary regionally.
- It makes no claim about what fence any animal needs. Netting height, mesh spacing and whether anything is wanted on top are husbandry and welfare questions with real consequences, and they belong with the supplier, the breed society and the page rather than with a calculator that would look like it had settled them.
- Nothing here says a fence may lawfully go where it is drawn. Boundaries, rights of way and any planning position are separate questions and a quantity does not settle them.
- Labour, bracing timber, staples, tensioners and the tools to strain wire are not costed, and on a long run contracted labour frequently exceeds the materials.
- Ground is assumed workable. Rock, peat and waterlogged ground change the method rather than the quantity, and change the price a great deal.
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