8G 



THE UPPER PINE BELT. 



TILLAGE AND IMPPvOVEMENT. 



Enclosures, under the colonial laws, that have not been changed, are 

 required to be cattle proof. The fences are built of pine rails ten feet 

 in length, running about one hundred to the cord, Avorth usually fifty 

 cents a cord, and are split for fifty cents per hundred, making the cost 

 one dollar per hundred in the woods. Fourteen rails make eight feet in 

 length of worm fence, or 9,240 rails per mile, lasting, on an average, five 

 years. A recent act of the legislature allows each township to determine 

 by vote, whether the crops or the stock shall be enclosed, if the latter, the 

 township to tax itself for the fences necessary to protect it from the stock 

 of the adjoining townships. To this date few townshi^^s in this belt have 

 availed themselves of this laAv.* 



Drainage is little practiced in this region ; the culture of the swamps 

 being generally abandoned, and the uplands being thought not to require 

 it. In Marlboro and Marion, however, great benefit results from a system 

 of open ditclies very generally adopted (see above soils). Little or noth- 

 ing is required in the way of hillside ditches on these comparatively level 

 lands, Avhere little injury is experienced from washing. 



The former practice of allowing fields to lie fallow, for the benefit of 

 the growth of weeds, Avhich increased the vegetable matter in the soil, and 



*Since the above was written the State legislature has passed a general law for 

 the whole State, making it incumbent on the owners of live stock to see that they 

 do not trespass on others. Thetillerof thesoil is no longer com{)elled to build fences to 

 protect thefruitsof his labor from the inroads of his neighbors' cattle, thus saving all cost 

 in building and repairing fences, estimated in 187U at $917,000 by the 10th U. S. Census. 



