Staining your deck not only makes it look beautiful, but deck stains help protect your deck from the harsh elements.
A deck stain protects your deck from water damage that will slowly discolor and rot your deck wood.
Deck stains also protect from sun damage that will slowly grey out your wood and cause it to split.
A well applied deck stain should provide adequate protection from the elements for roughly 2-5 years depending on your location.
Check out the posts below for more information on deck staining.
Fence Staining
Fence staining is much like deck staining, only you can expect to get a longer life out of your fence stain due to the fact that the boards are vertical rather than horizontal.
Horizontal boards get more wear from water, sun, and foot traffic and thus wear out significantly faster.