Gate Maintenance

I believe you can judge a farm by its gates and fences. Well maintained gates and reasonably good fences show that the farmer has stock such as cattle or sheep. These are both expensive and mobile, so you need to keep them in your field and not on the road or in someone else's lorry in the dead of night.

Poor fences and gates show that the farm has shifted to arable crops: Wheat, Oats or Malting Barley. This tends to stay where it's put, so you can let the gates rust away. Don't let your boundaries decay too much though. You may find the next crop in your field might be an encampment of travellers.

Really excellent fences and brand new gates indicate a hobby farm funded by a banker or alternatively a rather successful racing stud.

If you have something valuable in the field such as horses, cattle, farm machinery, land rovers or piles of metal, then you had better chain and padlock the gate at both ends.

So there you go. Snaarman's guide to gate maintenance. Aah. The simple country life, eh?