Northern Divide Bear Project - Cattle Exclusion Fences

Cattle Exclusion Fence Photographs

Cattle graze in many areas of grizzly bear habitat within the Northern Divide Bear Project study area. From previous experience we learned cattle enter bear hair traps depositing large amounts of their hair on the barbs and sometimes knocking down the strand of barbed wire. In order to prevent this, we constructed a temporary cattle exclusion fence around the bear hair trap sites located in an areas where cattle graze. The extra fencing may look like a deterrent to bears, but bears living in these areas move through fences like this repeatedly each day as they traverse fields and ranch lands and have no problem moving in and out of these sites.

Cattle exclusion fences can be setup using only trees, some trees, or only T-posts depending on availability of suitable trees. Below are photographs of cattle exclusion fences constructed in various habitat during the 2003 field season.

This site had suitable trees for the cattle exclusion fence and the hair trap (hair trap trees are flagged).
This site had suitable trees for the hair trap barbed wire in 2004, but T-posts were necessary for the cattle exculsion fence.

This site was located in open prairie far from any trees. T-posts were used for the cattle exclusion fence and additional posts were installed to provide anchor points for the hair trap barbed wire in 2004.

  Cattle Exclusion Diagrams

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