4 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
FAR M FEN CING- 
This is a subject fast attracting the atten¬ 
tion of our American farmers where stone 
does not abound. In our stony regions that 
material has heretofore offered the best, and 
on the whole, cheapest kind of fence, inas¬ 
much as their removal from the fields has 
rendered the soil more available for cultiva¬ 
tion, and furnished them with sufficient en¬ 
closures. The tendency among our farm¬ 
ers in general has been towards too much 
fencing; that is to say, a division of their 
farms into too many small fields, occasion¬ 
ing loss of ground, and much additional la¬ 
bor in tilling them by reason of “ short bouts” 
in plowing, as well as giving harbors to the 
small vermin which all sorts of fence, more 
or less, protect in their depredations on 
the crops. This excessive fencing is rapid¬ 
ly going out of use by the increased expense 
of fencing material, and the higher prices of 
labor, as well as by our modes of improved 
agriculture in the use of farm machinery and 
labor-saving implements, so rapidly coming 
into practice. Still, fences we must have, 
and excessive fencing too ; for, in our land 
of “ liberty and equality,” an agricultural 
community of a thousand substantial farm¬ 
ers, who keep all their small stock secure 
within their own premises, must spend an 
extra thousand dollars apiece in fencing 
against the pigs and geese of a dozen Irish¬ 
men, scattered about in their shanties, who 
own not a foot of land nor pay any taxes, 
yet maintain the prosciiptiveWgAt to pasture 
'their stock in the highway, against which 
the real land owners must, perforce, secure 
themselves at their own expense ! 
Our stony districts provide easily against 
such marauding, because the material they 
use, of necessity, makes a tight fence, but 
not so with others, who have to resort to 
wood for that object. With them is fast 
arising the serious question of what they are 
in future to rely upon as their best, cheap¬ 
est, and most available, as well as desirable 
fencing material. The question of hedges 
has long been discussed in our agricultural 
papers, and it is asked, why not adopt thorn 
hedges in America as well as in England ? 
The ready answer to this is, that our frosts 
are too deep in winter, and our droughts too 
severe in summer for their successful 
growth and standing in the soil. In England 
the summers are moist and cool, with no 
protracted drouths; the banks supporting 
them stand firmly, as the frosts do not heave 
and crumble them down into the ditches as 
they do here, thus giving them a free and 
succulent growth in summer, and a firm 
footing in winter, while here, cultivated in 
the same manner, the banks crumble from 
the winter frosts, and if planted on the level 
ground they do not thrive. Theoretically, 
this statement has been strongly combatted, 
many experiments and trials in thorn hedg¬ 
ing have been'ffiiade within the past fifty 
years, and the result is, after protracted la¬ 
bors and great expense, that scarcely a mile 
of secure thorn hedge can be found in all 
our Northern States. Besides this, wood 
fencing has been so comparatively cheap 
that our farmers have managed in some way 
i or other to get along thus far, but with an 
enormous outlay in first building, and after¬ 
wards in a great annual outlay in their re¬ 
pairs, which they have not yet, or until of 
late, seriously considered. 
There must, ere long, be a remedy for 
this ; and that partially in the fewer subdi¬ 
visions of interior fences on our farms, and 
in the use of a better material more cheaply 
furnished than formerly. In the first of these 
reforms, England is rapidly giving us a prof¬ 
itable example, in demolishing thousands of 
miles of their ancient hedges, in opening 
their small fields into larger ones, and the 
substitution of iron, so cheap and abund¬ 
ant there when new enclosures are required. 
The iron we have not yet arrived at. It is 
too costly; but in the abundance of our ore 
beds, and the cheaper manner in which we 
are making it, it will no doubt within the 
time of another generation be widely used 
for fencing purposes. But that is not now. 
We need something to supply our present 
wants. Since the opening of our great 
western prairies to cultivation, the public 
mind in that quarter has been actively 
awake to the practicability of the Osage Or¬ 
ange as a material for hedging. Millions of 
plants have been propagated for the purpose, 
and hundreds, perhaps thousands, of miles 
have been planted in fence within the last 
five years. Those adopting it, are hopeful 
of success—we trust with certainty—but the 
result has not yet been ascertained. The 
Osage Orange is a rapid growing plant, ma¬ 
king long upright shoots through the sum¬ 
mer ; but the winter frosts have cut them 
down almost to the ground in the winter, 
even as far south as Lower Illinois, in lati¬ 
tude 39° as effectually as in 43° north. The 
next ten years to come will probably settle 
the question one way or the other. The 
common varieties of the American thorn, we 
consider altogether doubtful for hedging pur¬ 
poses, although hardy as when applied to 
thick hedging it mildews and does not ap¬ 
pear to thrive ; at all events, the trials made 
with it have not been generally successful. 
These reflections lead us to the inquiry of 
what are to be our reliable fencing materials 
for the future in the absence of stone 1 We 
frankly answer—we do not positively know. 
Lumber of different kinds is yet abundant in 
wide districts of our country, and may con¬ 
tinue to be for generations to come, as much 
waste land exists where the soil cannot be 
devoted to better purposes than growing it. 
Such districts, of course, are provided for. 
Yet we have still more extensive agricultu¬ 
ral districts, where the soil is nearly all 
equally well adapted to cultivation, and the 
balance equally available by slight ditching 
and drainage ; and in these the question re¬ 
curs with great force, and we do not know 
that we can at present suggest any better 
practice than to enact laws preventing the 
running at large of all animals on the high¬ 
ways, making fewer subdivisions of fields 
and adopting the cheapest effective enclo¬ 
sures of lumber. Iron wire may come in as 
a part of the material in such cases, and the 
use of a light cheap wood-work may effect 
the rest. 
There have been various “patent” inven¬ 
tions of fence, some of which may be worth 
trial, others of which are worthless from 
their want of efficiency, and the great ex¬ 
pense attending them. But the properly se¬ 
curing of our fields is not yet desperate. 
Stringent laws, restraining the running at 
large of cattle, sheep, pigs and geese, can 
easily be enacted by our legislatures, and 
they should be in spite of the opposition of 
malcontents. Our farmers—and they are 
the great body of our producing classes— 
have it in their power to protect themselves 
against outside marauders, and if they neg¬ 
lect this the fault is their own. With the 
other objects they must contend as best 
they may, outside the stony districts, and 
in these we can do no better than to recom¬ 
mend them to clear their fields of these ob¬ 
structions and convert them into the best 
kind of walls. We shall recur, on future oc¬ 
casions, to this subject again.— [Ed. 
AGRICULTURAL JOURNALS FOR PREMIUMS. 
The annual meetings of our County and 
State Agricultural Societies are usually held 
at this season of the year, and arrangements 
are made for the exhibition next Fall. These 
societies are accomplishing great good by 
these exhibitions, and their annual reports 
and addresses. We think, however, there 
is hardly prominence enough given in the 
premium list to principles. You will find 
ten premiums offered for good butter, cheese 
or bread, where you find one for an essay 
upon the principles that underlie dairy man¬ 
agement, grain growing, stock raising, and 
kindred pursuits. 
The mass of our population not only want 
to see the best samples of their own indus¬ 
try, but a more thorough acquaintance with 
the science of husbandry. Our agricultural 
societies should give this more prominence. 
We all learn something at the fairs' worth 
knowing, but they should be followed up 
with a little more didactic teaching to secure 
their best results. If we would add to the 
fair the distribution of agricultural and hor¬ 
ticultural journals, in the place of a part of 
the money premiums, we think it would be 
an important step in advance towards the 
realization of the aims of these societies. It 
is no part of the object of these associations 
to enrich their members directly by pecuni¬ 
ary rewards for their products. At best 
they are but a slight compensation for the 
time and trouble required by the exhibition. 
They compensate the exhibitors directly by 
giving them valuable information, inciting 
them to improvement in their stock, and in 
their methods of cultivation. A few dollars 
then, more or less, in the premium list, 
would not probably make any very material 
difference in the extent of the exhibition, or 
in the sharpness of the competition for pre¬ 
miums. 
With the more intelligent patrons of the 
fair, the journal premiums would probably 
be an additional attraction. If they already 
take and read one good agricultural paper 
it has taught them the economy of the out¬ 
lay, and sharpened their appetite for more. 
