Honing the fencing skills of young students was on the curriculum at Timaru Girl’s High School recently
The school’s Young Farmers Club has a strong group of around 20 girls who are actively involved.
Throughout the year, the club organises guest speakers and field trips relevant to primary industries, also organising sponsorship from local businesses to support them with these events and enabling them to purchase merchandise.
At a recent fencing skills afternoon, hosted by one of their sponsors, Dan Douglass Fencing, Dan set out to extend the girls’ knowledge of fencing, beyond the bit of experience that most of them had.
The girls built a strainer and stay, with a short five-wire fence and hung a gate. Dan and his worker Harry showed them how to hit in posts in a safe manner and get them straight. Students also learned about the materials needed for electric fencing and how to install them. They tied termination knots and installed egg insulators and triplex strainers, finishing off with learning how to hang a gate properly so that it swings nicely.
There was also a bit of theory involved, where they had to label fencing items, some of which they hadn’t seen before.
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