CLEARING LAND. 231 

Partially cleared land in sheep pasture. 
the root in the ground, while if pulled green the fibrous roots 
bring up a mass of earth difficult to loosen. This indicates 
that the cheapest method is to pasture the land for three or 
four years after the timber is cut before pulling the stumps. 
Pine stumps containing heartwood do not decay appreciably 
though the small roots rot off. They are apparently just as 
sound after twenty years as when cut. 
In pulling stumps much can be done with blocks and 
chain or cable, in lieu of astump puller. If the largerstumps 
are split with dynamite and the roots cut,a good team with 
two blocks will pull out nearly everything. In no case does 
it pay to pull very large pine stumps whole. After they are 
pulled they are very hard to handle. Bysplitting them with 
dynamite the pieces may be pulled separately. This allows 
the use of a small stump puller which can be dragged about 
and set up quickly and easily. Dynamite does very efficient 
work on stumps in thus splitting them and in blowing most 
of the dirt off the roots so that they will burn more easily. 
It is inserted under thestump in a hole made in the dirt with 
