When I was a boy, sagging fences of rusted wire crisscrossed the countryside. Old cedar and locust fence post, burdened with vines, stood askew at regular intervals like rows of weary soldiers. Fence rows separated fields so farm animals could not get into the fields and eat the crops. Some fences were like new but others were old, broken down, and rusty. The rusty wire fence was overgrown with weeds, raspberry thickets and mulberry trees. I loved to stop and eat mulberries when they were black and ripe and falling all over the ground.
I knew about the wild creatures that inhabited fence rows: Foxes in dens; rabbits in nests; groundhogs in tunnels; deer in beds; and quail, pheasants and hobos. We hunted and hunted all of them in the winter of hard times, but mom said all hobos rode the trains south for the winter. I guess they did. I never saw a hobo along fence rows or along railroad tracks in the winter.
Wildlife flourished in fence rows where food and shelter was abundant. And they, in turn, fed a lot of hungry kids. Most farm boys and their friends from town headed for the closest fence row when rabbit-hunting season was underway. We all knew that rabbits lived there and more than once rabbit ended up on the dinner table, fried to a golden brown.
We gathered raspberries and took them home for pies and strawberries and strawberry shortcake were summertime favorites, courtesy of the fence rows. The mulberries turned our hands black, a stain that had to wear off but the taste was worth having stained fingers.
Some fence rows eventually grew ten feet or more, on both sides of the rusty wire, out into the fields. What had originally been a wire field fence about a foot wide became a kind of habitat for wildlife and was as wide as the farmers left it get.
Horses and wagons drove up and down the fences and created paths or lanes worn deep in the ground by teams of huge horses pulling heavy wagons loaded with corn, hay and other crops.
Between these paths, where the wheels rolled, was a grassy ridge the horse never walked on and wheels never rolled over. These paths were referred to as “lanes”— rain made them muddy.
My dog and I explored the fence rows but avoided the rock piles because they might harbor a snake or two and I was afraid of snakes.
Dung beetles rolled marble-like manure balls down the dusty lanes. That was something city kids never got to see. Those lazy days of youth are gone now. Not even the fence rows remain — I wonder where all the animals that lived there went? I don’t know where young boys and their dogs go to explore their future.