Most of our barbed wire fence on our property is literally older than my dad and through many years of heavy use it has started to fall apart. That means we are building fence this summer. These pictures illustrate how we do it.
After drilling the hole with our incredibly old tractor (it's from the 1960s), we drop the post in, get it the right height, make sure it's straight and then tamp it in. The "tamping" bar we use is actually some sort of part from an old tractor. It works perfectly to pack down the dirt around the post. We put about 2 inches of dirt in the hole, pack it down, add more dirt, pack it down and keep repeating the process until the hole is filled.
The most challenging part of this is actually driving the tractor. It's a great tractor and has served our family well since it was purchased brand new. However, it barely steers (you can literally turn and turn the steering wheel and it won't turn unless you do it just right) and it has issues shifting into the forward gears. I'm usually pretty sore after running it for a couple of hours.
The corner post was the first post we set because it will keep everything nice and tight. To do it we set two posts with a piece of metal wedged between them and two wires to keep the posts pulled in tight.
Since there was a slight hill where we were building the fence, dad improvised to be able to see so he could line up his posts.
After putting a post in the middle of the fence line, we used the scope on dad's 17 rifle to make sure we were lined up (don't worry, dad made sure to remove all of the bullets before we did this).
All this being said, I'm known for my ability to make any fence I build completely crooked. So...despite all the preparations, it more than likely won't be the prettiest fence ever. My only consolation is that at least it will look better than the old one ;-)
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