548 
Portable Fencing for Sheep, 
For Warwickshire use, the light hurdles are undoubtedly best, 
because hares cannot gnaw the bars through, and because the 
hands are better up to the setting of them. Each farmer has his 
own flock ; the fields are smaller, and if the hounds come in 
sight, and the sheep get up into a corner, there is less danger of 
any bfeing caught and strangled. Still I cannot call to mind any 
one case of death arising from strangulation. 
According to the requirements of the Scottish flockmaster, the 
system of netting as above described is undoubtedly the best 
which could be adopted. It is for the English farmer, in any 
given case, to decide for himself which will answer his purpose 
best. 
Mi". Swan, of Inverpeffer, near Arbroath, has favoured me with 
A letter calling attention to a fence for sheep of a more per- 
manent character, which, however, admits of being occasionally 
removed. 
He writes : — " To a tenant holding a nineteen years' lease, 
permanent sheep-fencing constructed with posts and top-rail of 
wood, and wire of the requisite size underneath, is the most con- 
venient, and in the end the cheapest." 
He recommends that the fence be set upon a soil-bank 
(1^ feet high), with a trench, to prevent the animals from rub- 
bing against it. Such a bank may be cheaply and rapidly 
formed, by the aid of the plough, in a level field. He estimates 
the cost of gates or straining posts of larch (7-| feet long, and not 
less than 6 inches in diameter at top) at l.s. each; of the smaller 
larch posts (4 to 5 feet) at ocl. to 3if/. apiece ; the top rail (4^ by 
1^) at 125. or 135. per 100 yards ; the wire (Nos. 6 and 7) at 14.<f. 
per cwt. Two active men, armed with a set of wire fencing 
tools, which cost 255. per set, and a bag of staples, may set up 
such fences, having two or three wires beside the top rail, round 
a twenty-acre field in a week. 
To steady the fence the straining posts should be sunk at least 
3 feet into the ground, and an angle rail of the size of the top 
rail should be firmly nailed on to the top of the principal post, 
across the centre of the first common post, and built against the 
bottom of the second. I believe that fences of this description 
are coming pretty extensively into use in the North. 
The foUoiring Report lias also hecn received as to the use of Nets 
in the East Riding of Yorkshire. 
In the East Riding of Yorkshire sheep are invariably folded 
on turnips and rape by nets. This is considered the readiest and 
most economical way ; indeed it would be next to impossible to 
