What are They? How Do they Work?

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Navigation: Milligan Creek Ag - Main Page > Products > Quick Electrified Water Gap Kits™

Our water gap kits are an easy and inexpensive way to solve the problem of making livestock-proof water gaps in electrified fence systems.

Our kits consist of vertical wires or light chains (which we call droppers), spacers, clips, and other components. The droppers ...are vertical chains or wires which hang down from the fence and, because they are electrified by the fence, make a barrier to livestock escape. hang from the bottom wire of an electrified fence (or on a separate wire or cable if desired) and take up most of the space between the fence wire and the ground (if installed over a ditch or low area) or the surface of a stream. The droppers are automatically electrified by the fence wire they hang on, creating a barrier (electric shock!) to livestock escape just as the rest of the fence does.

Our droppers—whether wire or chain—are smooth and free swinging. They let water and debris pass beneath the water gap during times of high stream flow, then return to vertical after the debris has passed beneath and/or stream flow has returned to normal.

Here is a kit with wire droppers installed over an 8-foot-deep dry ditch (it only carries water during a rain). Each of the droppers extends downward to about 18" from the ditch bottom and sides and—because they are electrified by the fence wire—are a barrier to livestock escape.

Kits are available to span almost any width, using either factory-straightened galvanized wire or stainless steel light chain (your choice) as droppers. Here is kit with chain droppers, installed over a newly completed waterway:

Spacers are available in orange or black. They keep the droppers separated by an appropriate amount and add visibility to the fence, preventing livestock (and people) from accidentally walking into or running through the water gap wire.

Our spacers are made of UV resistant flexible PVC plastic for long life, and are slit down one side for easy installation on an existing fence wire: you do not need to thread spacers onto the wire as you build a fence. In fact, it's easiest to install our kits after building the fence.

Another way to install our water gap kits is to hang them on a separate wire or cable which spans the stream or ditch and is insulated from the main fence. When installed this way, electricity is usually supplied to the kit through a switch or a flood gate controller ("energy limiter"). Either option lets you shut off the electricity to the water gap while stream flow is high and the droppers are in contact with water, keep the main fence "hot". (Otherwise, the entire fence would be shorted out, making livestock escape more likely.)

"Won't high water short out my fence?"