230 NORTHEAST EXPERIMENT FARM. 
clear, should be regarded with suspicion as its fertility may 
have been greatly impaired by the fires. On heavier soils the 
injury is not so pronounced and here the fire may have been 
of great help in reducing the amount of work necessary in 
clearing. 
In clearing standing hardwood timber or small pine, as 
jack pine, the trees may be made to aid by their weight, in 
pulling the stump by cutting the roots and pulling the tree 
over. This needs a double block and chain or rope, witha 
chunk or log laid next to the stump to lift the roots clear in 
the fall. This chain is attached forthe pull as high up the tree 
as possible. More often the timber, especially pine, has been 
or will be cut, and the stumps left. The ground between them 
iscleared and broken and eithercropped orseeded down until 
the stumps are removed. In brushing and subduing the 
land,sheep are anaid in keeping downsprouts about certain 
classes of hardwood stumps, but chiefly in destroying small 
brush and in their effect on the soil. They will not pull down 
or kill brush that stands five feet high or over. This will 
have to be cut. But the roots in the soil rut, and its wild- 
ness is mellowed by the tramping, grazing and manure of 
the sheep. Soil that has been closely pastured for 3 years, 
by sheep, on the farm was easily broken by a common cross 
plow, and raised 200 bushels of potatoes in 1902, when 
broken late the preceding fall. Thusit is seen that sheepcan 
do only a limited amount of work in clearing, but as they 
are getting a living at the same time, their services are so 
much clear gain to the work. The stumps rot more quickly 
when pastured about than if grown up in brush. The cost 
of brushing, picking up and burning exclusive of stumping 
or removing standing timber will vary from $2.00 to $8.00 
per acre. For gathering fine brush and rubbish an iron 
rake may be used whose teeth are bent back at the tips to 
run easily over the surface. A blacksmith can make one, 
mounting the teeth in a wooden back for lightness. 
Stumping is the chief expense of clearing. With hard 
wood and small sappy Norway or Jack pine, the stumps rot 
in three or four years, and when pulled then do not bring up 
much dirt,come easier and yetare solid enough not to break 
off. If left much longer many of them will break, leaving 
