Split Rail Fence

It's that time of year again. Time to clean up the dead fall of winter. Here's a forty foot elm that I was able to cut into three 12 foot lengths.

Once cut into lengths I split them into halves and some larger halves into quarters.

These are the kind of rails Abe Lincoln spent his youth splitting. 

This kind of fence was very common at one time. It's easy to assemble, easy to move and easy to re-purpose if you run low on firewood or rough lumber. Ours won't keep anything in or out, just give hunters a heads-up when crossing our property lines.

The rails are stacked one on top of another in a zig-zag pattern to help with stability. Typically the rails are between 10 and 12 feet long, the ends are overlapped to make the distance between 'points" roughly eight feet. The distance between the zigs or zags is an old measurement called a rod (roughly 16 feet). Old farms used to measure out acreage using rods and these fences helped people estimate the size of their fields.