Description
Located in southern Oklahoma, the rancher was part of a team roping club and wanted an arena as part of his cattle handling system. The drive-thru stock trailer chute allowed the traffic in and out of this system more efficient. The trailer chute is 10 feet wide. The gates at the end are used to swing around and chain to the sides of the trailer before it unloads stock. Any type of stock trailer door will open in this design. Solid sided fences were installed in high use areas like the curved lane and crowd pen. All the principles for low stress handling are incorporated into this system. Blocking vision with solid fences keeps the cattle calm. Deep groove concrete floors also keep cattle calm, and give them confidence when walking through the facility. The last is curved fences. Curved fences promote forward motion and make cattle think they’re going back where they came from, and the curves prevents abrupt corners or chutes that appear dead-ended. Curved fences also take advantage of cattle’s natural tendency to circle. The pens, alleys, gates, and the curved fence area was built using surplus oil filed pipe. The gate posts and strike posts are 4-1/2″ OD pipe, the fence posts 2-7/8″ OD pipe, and the top rail, fence rails, and all the gates were made with 2-3/8″ OD pipe.
