A PRACTICAL SUGGESTION.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9033, 21 January 1908, Page 4

A PRACTICAL SUGGESTION.

Necessity is the mother of suggestion as well as invention. The late disastrous grass fires in this district have shown the necessity, of some steps being taken by the settlers to protect their fences from ignition by ■grass fires, and a very simple and inexpensive remedy has been suggested to us by a well-known runholder of many years' experience. The materials necessary consist merely of a supply of clay, a little water, and a large whitewash brush. The cl»y should be mixed with water into a thick wash and carefully applied with the brush to the posts and rails, and in the case of straining posts the holes should also be plugged with clay. The walls of houses and yard fences should undergo similar treatment. Our authority states-with confidence that if this method is syssematically'adopted the fire will not get hold of the wood or do any appreciable damage. The work could easily be done by farm or station hands, and the settler could then rest secure in this simple preventive so far as his fences and buildings are concerned. In the case of fences and buildings in the neighbourhood of a bush fire the result might be doubtful, but grass fires pass with such rapidity along the ground that there would be very little dangerto wooden material insulated in the manner described. The idea is certainly well worthy of a trial, and we commend the suggestion as a real practical one to the farmers of the Wairarapa. Had it been adopted before the recent grass fires got hold of the country possibly many miles of fencing would have been saved.