Democratic Sentinel, Volume 11, Number 20, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 June 1887 — Cost of Our Fences. [ARTICLE]

Cost of Our Fences.

The cost of all fences in the United States amounts to $1,747,549,931, or nearly equal to the interest-bearing debt, and about the same as the estimated value of all the farm animals, so that for every dollar invested in live stock another dollar is required for constructing protection against their ravages upon crops. The annual repairs, together w r ith interest on the amount invested in the existing fences, amounted to nearly $200,000,000, and the amount of wood needed must have been not far from five billion feet Colonel Ochiltree now says: “The more I know men the better I like dogs."