A Farm Toolbox: the T-Post Driver

When reaching for the t-post driver one knows they are in for a workout. A two-foot cast iron pipe, capped on one end, with handles on each side, it is used to drive a t-post into the ground. It weighs 25 pounds. A t-post is a steel post, typically six feet in length, used to support fencing such as barbed wire. Slip the driver over the post, level the post in all directions, then raise the driver up and bring it down with force. Repeat until the post is buried a foot in the ground.

T-post driver 2 001Its design is simple, primitive and highly effective. Brute energy directed on a single point accomplishes the task in short order. We have set over a thousand t-posts with the driver on our farm. Unlike its cousin the rock-bar, the driver has no other function. It hangs in the barn on its lonely hook for months at a time.

Many have been the day when, with the driver in one hand and several t-posts in the other, I’ve hiked a half-mile to a back fence. There to retire an old wooden post or two that had finally rotted away into mush. Or, other days, setting a new row of fifty posts, Cindy and I take turn pounding them into the dirt.

The act itself, the methodical raising and hammering down, is thoroughly satisfying. A release of accumulated aggressions into a constructive channel; where the ache between your shoulders the following day is an echo of work well done. And a sturdy fence, well made, is a reminder of the value in physical toil.

………………………………………………………………………………………

Reading this weekend: In Ruins by Christopher Woodward. A hard to characterize book, it is part travel writing and part meditation on the attraction of ruins. Think Ozymandias meets Haunts of the Black Masseur and you might be close.

FollowEmail this to someoneFollow on FacebookFollow on Google+Tweet about this on TwitterFollow on LinkedIn

One thought on “A Farm Toolbox: the T-Post Driver

  1. Pingback: A Farm Toolbox: T-Post Jack | Winged Elm Farm: Farm Notes

This author dines on your input.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.