Just a thing or two more. I want to ask you what are the best kinds of timber for us to put out on our tree claims. Will the black walnuts, black and white oaks do well as far north as we are? How will the Scotch and Norway pines do? I wish to put out such timber as will make good lumber when grown. Cotton wood, box elder, etc., will just answer the law, that is about all. A. J. FOORD, BROWN CO., DAKOTA. THE USE OF SALT. In THE PRAIRIE FARMER of January 5th, in report of Illinois Horticultural Society, Mr. Earle is made to say he used salt on asparagus and it killed the weeds and most of the asparagus. This is different from my limited experience; I have used lake salt at the rate of one ton to the acre and did not kill either weeds or asparagus. I am now making arrangements to use about three and one-half tons to the acre from the refuse of pork packing houses. Will Mr. Earle please give particulars in THE PRAIRIE FARMER: The kind of salt, time of year it was used, amount per acre, nature of soil, etc. By so doing he will confer a favor on many readers. S. P. TERRE HAUTE, IND. WOVEN PALING FENCE. A Washington firm of patent solicitors write us, as we suppose they have all the agricultural papers, warning readers against persons claiming of them a fee of $500 and upwards for alleged infringements of a patent upon a so-called “Wire and Picket Fence.” Our informants say that, “It is quite true that there are a number of patents for wire and picket fences, or so-called ‘woven paling fences,’ but all these patents are limited in their claims to the detailed construction of the woven fence, and there is no broad patent on this class of fence. Indeed it was invented as long ago as 1829, when Chauncy Hall, of Meriden, Ct., on November 27th, of that year, obtained the first patent for a wire and paling fence. All recent applications for patents which have endeavored to claim the woven fence broadly have been rejected, as we find by an examination of the records of the United States Patent Office, on the old patent to James Moore, of Pittsburg, Pa., for a woven picket fence, which was granted June 30, 1857, and therefore, expired in 1871, so that it is now public property. There is another patent of the same year granted to J. B. Reyman, of Bloomington, Ill., No. 18,301, dated September 29, 1857, which, also, shows a paling and wire fence, or picket and wire fence. This patent has, also, been frequently cited as a reference against applications of subsequent patentees who endeavor to claim broadly the invention of the combined wire and picket fence. In 1849, one, Lucius Leavenworth, obtained a patent for a method of constructing a fence by fastening pickets or palings upon the wires by means of a series of links formed on the connecting wires and adapted to receive or hold the pickets or palings. All of these patents have long ago expired, and are now public property, so that no person can claim to