how do you date the age of fence lines

[dmi]

please see attached photos

thanks for your help

[Stan_K]

Dane,

I presume these pictures are from CA, but NOT along the coast. I am guessing the posts in Picture 1 are +/- 100 years young. I had guessed the nail and "shiner" were 60 years old until I noticed your name for Picture 2. The barb on the top of the post looks unique. A "bard wire" museum may be able to date the wire. The posts in Picture 3 look to be 40 to 50 years old.

Just my $0.02

[E_Page]

Your pictures are missing an important feature to dating fence - the prongs.

You can identify the manufacturer and approximate date of manufacture surprisingly well by having a clear example of the wire (Type, number of strands, how it's wrapped) and the prongs (wire or blade, wrapped around wire strands, wrapped around 1 or more than one strand, how many times wrapped, shape of blade, how blade is attached to wires, spacing of prongs). I was amazed at the subtle differences between barbed wire types that allow one to identify them.

The book "Barbs, Prongs, Points, Prickers, and Stickers: A Complete and Illustrated Catalogue of Antique Barbed Wire" is a great resource for any surveyor performing rural boundaries. You can find it here:

http://www.amazon.com/Barbs-Prongs-Points-Prickers-Stickers/dp/0806108762/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1304612707&sr=8-1

If you have pictures showing the barbs in some detail and know the spacing, post them or email them to me. I'll take a look in my copy of the book when I get home.

Manufacture date doesn't necessarily translate to use date, but it will get you pretty close as most people don't use old wire to build a new fence.

Judging from the photos posted, I agree with Stan's estimate.


Edit: I see a prong right on top of the post. Wire type, single wrap on one wire. I can't get a good estimate of the spacing though.

[RAM]

Time for a road trip, we have a good display of barb wire with dates in our local history center, take a day and take a tour, the Merced River is about to peak and the waterfalls in Yosemite are at a max.

[dmi]

Yes, this is in Ca. The nail and tin are called for on a 1944 survey and is an accessory to an iron pin set by the same survey that we dug up today. The 1944 survey calls this fence line an old fence line.

I have the Clifton book and it leaves me just scratching my head. Stan,I am glad you think the old post is a hundred years old, cuz, the parent parcel beign surveyed is from a subdivision recorded in 1911. Stan, can you give me your reason why you think this post is 100 years old.

Evan, below are pictures of wire that ought to help with the questions you raise.

[Stan_K]

Dane,

The 100 years is an educated guess based on the amount of weathering. ASSUMING the post was not retrieved from the ocean, it takes 90 to 120 years to get that amount of wood to "wear" away. Too much time spent retracing old lines in dry climates.

[land butcher]

5 pics and not a tape measure in any of them.

New age surveyor's don't even carry yo-yo's anymore.



j/k just yanking your fence a little.

[dmi]

Oh yeah we all know that the 1850 nit-picker prickers are space 5 3/8" apart whereas the the modern version is 5 9/16" and had I only snapped a photo with a pocket tape in it, then LB would be able to tell me definately which one was which.

Good tip LB next time, I'll snap with p-tape.

[MFORD]

Dane,
I had a similar situation a few years ago and used the book Evan mentioned to help determine the age of a fence. I also consulted an elder surveyor in my area who pointed out that fence manufactures made fences of all types over decades, some old designs are still being manufactured. The book is worth the investment.

[dmi]

Thanks Mike, that is good info. I have the book that Evan mentioned and I finally figured out how to date the wire from it. The wire type I found is similar to a type patented in 1897 and this is 14 years before the subdivision I am working in was recorded.

Clearly, wire types and fence posts could be recycled and popular styles manufactured many decades after they were first used or came to market.

I will see if I can find an old timer in the area, that can help out

[Lehmann]

I usually run up or down the fenceline to see if the fence has been grown over and is then "into" a tree. Then I'll either bore into the tree to get a ring count, or with permission cut into or cut the tree down to clearly age it.

[dal20/30]

Not that it will help with dating the fence, the fence post in the first picture has been reused. It was common practice to "flip" wooden posts and remove the rotten wood, hence the inverted V look to the post. You might find the origional post hole adjacent to the current post location.