Till: FARM HOLDING. I (■"» 



Dead trees are handled in fche same manner as stumps (and without a 

 battery) by working round the main roots, one at a time, shattering some 

 right up against the butt, and others several feet away. The latter are ha ndlcd 

 by grubbing a hole on top of the root with the chisel bar and putting the charge 

 right on the timber, tamping the soil down on it with the thick end of the 

 mattock handle after the blade has been temporarily removed. Having 

 shattered all the roots satisfactorily, the trunk can be handled in much the 

 same way as the log was handled, by boring a hole about two-thirds through, 

 but at an angle of about 45 degrees ; a hole is easier, both to bore, charge, 

 and tamp at an angle than horizontal. After splitting, a few days may be 

 given to allow of the tree drying out before firing. Should the trunk be 

 hollow, it is unnecessary to split it, as the fire will soon reach the inside 

 when once the roots are shattered close up. With a greater realisation of 

 the advantages of the chisel bar and a correspondingly greater use of it, 

 together with the advantage the grub charge hole has over the auger or 

 bulb bar hole, much of the difficulty which at present attaches to the 

 handling of big timber without a battery might be overcome, or at least 

 looked at without prejudice. The " bulled " hole, handled as described 

 above, is a further big advantage, both as to the explosives saved and the 

 result^ obtained. 



Approximate and Comparative Costs.* 



Taking gehgnite at Id. per plug, ordinary No. 6 detonators at Id. each r 

 and fuse at Is. per coil of 24 feet, which would mean |d. per foot, some idea 

 ean be given of what the cost should approximate in clearing land. It will 

 be conceded that the conditions enumerated earlier are ever varying, and 

 with them the skill of the operator, so that hard-and-fast accuracies as 

 to costs are not so simple as one might believe. If as a basis of 

 explanation a solid hardwood stump of 4 feet diameter, with 4 feet above 

 ground, and five fairly solid hip roots, is taken, it would take to hand-grub 

 it. say about a day and a half, and costs 15s., with labour at 10s. per day. 



On the above basis, if handling it with gelignite, &c, 15s. would purchase 

 just 180 plugs at Id. each, but as detonators and fuse would also be required, 

 we may deduct Is. for detonators and Is. for a coil of fuse, which should 

 be ample, leaving the amount at 13s., which represents 156 plugs of gelignite. 

 If each packet of gelignite contains fifty plugs, ws have three full packets, 

 and with them such a stump could be blown right out of sight, and instead 

 of taking one and a half days, it would take, say, about one hour to prepare 

 and fire. 



This was the method employed when explosives were first used for 

 clearing in New .South Wales, but it was unnecessarily expensive, and the 

 method now recommended consists of using only sufficient explosive to split 

 the stump up so that it will burn easily. 



To split and burn such a stump, all the charges are best put in with the chisel 

 bar, so as to get the gelignite right up against the timber to be split, as it is 

 there that it gives its maximum effect. Taking each hip root singly, and 

 having grubbed the first hole well under the heavy part of the root up against 

 the stump, we decide to put in, say, three plugs of gelignite, which, with one 



* The prices quoted on this and the following page were current a few years ago, but 

 both explosives and labour have since risen considerably. The changes do not, how- 

 ever, affect the general contention as to the economy of explosives for clearing purposes. 



