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["Lynn Wigglesworth" <lynnw1366 AT hotmail.com>]

Around here, a "stone boat" usually refers to the hood off an old car. 
People hook them up to tractors and drag things around in them.

Lynn Wigglesworth
Tioga Co. PA
----- Original Message ----- 
From: <Clansgian AT wmconnect.com>
To: <homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Monday, January 12, 2009 3:17 PM
Subject: Re: [Homestead] was Random thoughts about the day, now tote sleds


> > >Not Lynn, but I too use a tote sled for just about anything in the
> > winter---
>
> There's a type of sled used around here and is a traditional piece of
> Appalachian farm equipment.  It's called a "stone boat" because it is 
> sturdy enough
> to haul a load of stones out of the fields as they were unearthed by the 
> plow.
> But is is also used for wood, hay, and everything else.
>
> The runners are made of locust logs and if done properly it can be dragged
> over a pasture or hayfield and hardly leave a mark.  It's intended to be 
> horse
> drawn, of course.
>
> A similar device is the hay sled proper, two log runners with a wide 
> platform
> and standards.  Here abouts wheeled vehicles for horses are dicey.  But 
> with
> a sled, when the horse or team pulls it up (or down) a slope and the horse
> needs to stop, the sled stops too.
>
> Also there is little danger of runaway.  Herself was training an unruly
> Belgian and when the onwer came for her (the Belgian, no matter how many 
> offers I
> made!), the horse suppressed six weeks of training and went wild.  Herself
> hitched her to the stone boat and had all of us sit in it.  The horse 
> again went
> wild, but after dragging the stone boat 100 feed under full load, decided
> better of it.  This going wild business was a lot of work!
>
> James
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