barbed wire = evil
It looks great in movies. The old, sagging fences stretching across mountainous landscapes or in the background as the cowboy trots past on his steed. Or maybe the other scene where the cowboy puts up a fence, never snagging or slicing himself in the process. Well, I must let you in on a little secret: barbed wire is not as great as they build it up to be. In fact, I would prefer to never see a piece of that nasty stuff ever again!
Let me explain. We’ve taken down barbed wire fencing from our pasture over the course of the past few months. This process has been terrifying and has made us realize one thing. We desperately need tetanus shots! And thicker gloves! Barbed wire that has been on a line for years does not like to be rolled up. It doesn’t like to even think about bending or stay in the position that you bend it into. It does, however, enjoy popping every which direction and I think it especially gets a thrill out of slicing humans. I have been walking around with band-aid-covered legs for weeks now and I get some pretty strange looks! OK, I will admit that during the first barbed wire removal experience I was wearing shorts and a t-shirt. Probably not the best outfit choice for the day. I did learn why cowboys always wore jeans and long sleeves – even in the summer!
Rolling up the barbed wire was probably the worst idea we could have ever come up with! I did research online and the general consensus was to roll it up. Easier said than done, people! We finally started cutting the pieces ever few posts and then rolling it…also not a good idea. But we did the entire fence line this way! Transporting these massive balls of death was almost as bad as taking it off the fence. It doesn’t want to stay in nice little piles. And every time a strand of barbed wire touches another strand they somehow link together and become nearly impossible to separate! I found myself cursing the creator of such an evil torture tool. Who would put this up on a fence? Who would expose animals…and humans…to such a thing? Why was it in my horse pasture? I couldn’t believe anyone would put this up in a pasture for horses. Where horses will touch it. And rub on it. And lick it. And stick their heads through it. And if they look at it wrong, they’ll get massively injured. What were they thinking?!?!
The next week, we learned from our mistakes…kind of. We cut the evil barb at every fence post, making small bundles of it to pick up later. This worked much better until we discovered that the people who put up the fencing decided to add a 5th line so close to the ground that we had to dig most of it up. At least we weren’t rolling it. Anything was better than rolling it. So we completed that project and moved on to the long side of the rectangle. With our new method of removal, the evil barb didn’t stand a chance. We showed it who was boss! And the evil barb went down. Forever. No more barbed wire! We threw a party.
The next time you take a drive out in the country, pay special attention to the fencing. Someone had to put it up…and another poor soul will be forced to remove it. Just think about that if you ever consider using this horrendous material for anything other than crafts to sell at the local flea market!!
