The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1879-10-23
Farm Barns.

THERE is no such thing as a plan of
farm barn that will be suitable for
universal use. The ever-varying uses
to which farms are devoted must call
for barns especially designed for the
crops produced and the animals sup
ported in each individual case. The
site of the barn is also to be considered
as well as the material of which it is
to be constructed, yet there are some
general principles that will so come
into nearly every case that it will be
well to state some of them. Barns are
made to hold and protect crops and for
sheltering and feeding animals, and to
secure great storing and stabling
capacity at the least cost is very i'm
portant. The least outside surface for
the most inside room is a point to be
considered. The square form is,
therefore, to be approached as nearly
as consistent with the uses to which the
building is to be put. Mechanical
work and economical use of material
are also points to be regarded in max
ing plans. A circular barn would have
more capacity in proportion to its sur
face than a square one, but would take
too much mechanical work, and if
made of wood too great waste of ma
terial.
AS the roof is the most costly as
well as the most perishable part of a
barn, the walls should be high, so that
there may be less surface Of roof re-
quired. For ordinary farm barns,
wood is the best material above the
foundation walls-and slate or tin
makes the best roof. If the roof is of
slate it must have considerable pitch,
that is, the rafters should rise at least
one foot to every two feet horizontal
measurement, and what the carpenters
call "one-third pitch - is still better,
and this gives, for roof of building
thirty-siN feet wide, twelve feet as the
rise from the walls to the center of the
roof. If tin is used very little pitch
is required, and much less strength OF
timber to support the weight Of the
roof. The cheapest siding for barn
is rough, unplaned inch boards, put
on vertically, nailed to sill and plate,
and intermediate horizontal timbers,
not much more than five feet apart
boards one foot wide, should have four
nails put in wherever they cross tim
Der, even to the braces, that should be
at top and lower end of the main
posts.
Paint on farm barns is ornamental,
but very unnecessary expense. have
barn that is nearly forty years old,
seventy-five feet long by forty feet
wide, and twenty feet high above the
basement to the top of the side walls.
1t was sided with unplaned and un-
painted hemlock inch boards, and these
boards are apparently uninjured by the
"tooth of time" and bid fair to last
another forty years. The cost of one
painting when this barn was built, put
at interest, would long since have
amounted to sum more than sufficient
to pay for new boards. But one paint
ing would have only led to the necessity
of repainting as often as once in five
years. If a man paint his Outbuilding,
let him not flatter himself that he does
it to preserve the timber, but rather let
him say "a painted barn looks well-so
the expense is incurred"
In planning a barn, in no case pro-
vide q manure-cellar under horse or
COW stables. It is too much to ask,
even of brutes, to stand over the gases
of manure-cellars. Put the stables in
the basement and on the ground, and
provide for frequently cleaning opt the
manure, that your cows or horses may
have some reasonable enjoyment of life.
just here occurs to me point in re-
gard to storing carriages either over or
alongside horse-stables. It should
never be done. The ammonia from the
manure destroys the varnish, and
causes it to crack, and it INJURIES har-
nesses. A carriage-house should be
well separated from the stables, and if
the wheels can stand on the earth they
will hold the tires in dry time much
better than on floor with air under it.
Applying these general principles to
supposed 150-acre farm that is de-
voted to the production of hay and
grain, and on which cattle and sheep
are to be kept, if there is to be but one
barn, my plan would be to construct
stone walls for basement not less than