Stone Walls

[Lodge Scent]

I constantly marvel at all the stone walls that I come across while out detecting here in the woods of New England. It always made me wonder why anyone would even want to try and farm here in the first place if there were that many rocks to deal with. Interestingly, when the first settlers arrived in the 1600's and early 1700's, they did not have to deal with rocks. When they cut down the trees to make their farm plots they found relatively rich and stone free soils. So where did all these billions of stones that are in these thousands of miles of stone walls come from ??? The article below shed some light on how all these stones and stone walls came to be.


https://www.earthmagazine.org/article/history-science-and-poetry-new-englands-stone-walls#:~:text=Although%20the%20oldest%20documented %20stone,period%20that%20Thorson%20calls%20%E2%80% 9Cthe

[OxShoeDrew]

Such a comprehensive piece! A truly wonderful part of the world. Thanks!

[The Rebel]

A very good article. I've always marveled at the amount of man hrs that it took to build these walls that seem to go on for miles.

[Lodge Scent]

A very good article. I've always marveled at the amount of man hrs that it took to build these walls that seem to go on for miles.

I agree Rebel. Plus the brute strength it took to maneuver those rocks into place. Just look at how many 200+ lb rocks are just in any given 10 foot section of wall. I think those homesteaders were as hard as the rocks they were making into walls.

[badgers325]

Great read! We have some walls in WI as well.