. Elements of farm practice. Agriculture. 278 ELEMENTS OF FARM PRACTICE. poor condition that they are very Httle improvement to a farm, while on other farms they are straight, well built, well kept and a very great addition to the farm both in usefulness and in appearance. Fences are used to keep stock either in or out of j&elds. Formerly fences were made of rails, but of late years timber is more scarce and other fencing material is being used. Barbed wire and woven wire are now compara- tively cheap, easily put up, and so effective in enclosing stock that prac- tically all fencing is of
. Elements of farm practice. Agriculture. 278 ELEMENTS OF FARM PRACTICE. poor condition that they are very Httle improvement to a farm, while on other farms they are straight, well built, well kept and a very great addition to the farm both in usefulness and in appearance. Fences are used to keep stock either in or out of j&elds. Formerly fences were made of rails, but of late years timber is more scarce and other fencing material is being used. Barbed wire and woven wire are now compara- tively cheap, easily put up, and so effective in enclosing stock that prac- tically all fencing is of this material, even in timbered sections where rails are plentiful. Fence Posts.—There is a great number offence posts used every year, and, as timber becomes scarce, posts become more and more expensive. There are many different kinds of timber used for fence posts, and they vary in value according to their durability. Some kinds of posts will last from ten to twenty years before they rot, while other kinds will become useless in three or four years. As a rule, posts that last well are made of slow-growing timber, such as oak or cedar, while quick-growing timber, such as willow and Cottonwood, rots very quickly when placed in the soil. Posts deteriorate when set in the ground, by rotting. They usually rot off just below the surface of the ground, because here the soil keeps them moist and the air gets in from the surface, thus making conditions favorable for rotting. The top of the post does not rot, as it dries off too quickly, and the bottom of the post does not rot, be- cause the soil keeps the air away from it. A process-has been discovered by which wooden posts may be treated with creosote and thus made to last two or three times as long as when untreated. This process is Figure 123.—A poorly-braced corner post from which it is impossible to stretch wires that will remain Please note that these images are extracted from scanned page images that may have been d
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910, booksubjectagriculture, bookyear
