FARM MACHINERY. The function of farm machinery is to enable the farmer to produce not only larger crops but better crops than he can with only his simple hand tools. In fact, without the aid of such machinery the farmer of the present day finds it difficult to earn more than a bare living for an average family.
The machinery employed in modern farm ing falls naturally into four groups: (1) tilling machines, which prepare the soil to receive the seed; (2) drills, seeders and planters, for plac ing the seed in the ground; (3) cultivators, for working the growing crop; and (4) har vesting machines, for gathering the matured crop. In the first group belong the plows, harrows, drags and rollers; in the second, the grain and seed drills, the corn-planters and the potato-planters; in the third, the various forms of horse weeders, wheel-hose, fertilizer drills, corn-plows, etc.; and in the fourth, the corn binders and huskers, the potato diggers, the mowing machines, reapers and binders, the hay rakes and tedders, hay loaders and trolley forks: fanning mills, corn-shellers and the like.
Tilling The plow is the founda tional instrument of all agriculture, and it has been brought to its present state of scientific perfection only after tireless experimentation. The farmer of to-day finds at his disposal a long line of special purpose plows from which he may select the one best adapted to the soil he wishes to work, and to the condition in which the soil may be at the moment. On the ordinary farm, however, there will be found three types of plow, the sod plow with a long moldboard and a strong twist; the stubble plow, with a shorter moldboard and much less twist; and the corn cultivating plow, which ap proaches much more closely the simple wedge shape. The sod plow is designed not only to tear up the sod and turn it upside down, but also to break up thoroughly the texture of the earth clod. It is much more effective if it has a jointer attached. The jointer has the shape and form of a little plow, and gives the sod its first turn, allowing the plow itself to exert the desired shattering effect. The stubble plow
is used to break up land which was in cultiva tion the previous season. Its particular office is to break up and loosen the soil rather than to turn it over although its action partakes also of the turning movement. These two forms do most of the plowing on the average farm. The draft varies from 400 to 600 pounds, ac cording to the condition and constitution of the soil, and should be provided with such a num ber of horses, that each may have no more than a 200-pound pull. More than that tires the team to such an extent that the efficiency of the machinery . is seriously reduced. These plows are also combined into °gangs° of two plows or more, and when the motive power is a traction engine, many furrows may be turned at once. With a four-furrow gang plow and five horses one man can break up from five to seven acres per day. A gang of 10 to 20 plows drawn by a traction engine, with two men in attendance, will plow up to 50 acres per day. (See PLOW). Following the plow comes the harr row, and of this machine also there are many types, adapted to the soil to be worked and the crop to be raised. The object of the harrow is to reduce the soil to a condition of fineness in which the tender roots from the newly germi nated seed will find least resistance, and at the same time an abundance of air and moisture in the interspaces. To get the best results from the harrow it should be sent on to the plowed ground as soon after the plow has passed as may be. The ordinary spilce-tooth harrow is a very effective tool, and if it has long teeth which may be set for deep working it is quite sufficient for most soils. The spring-tooth and disc harrows have particular uses on special soils, and for very lumpy soils a clod-crusher is of great service, to precede the harrow. The drag or planker is used to smooth off un even parts of the harrowed field, and if the soil is very light and fluffy, the roller is indis pensable to produce a seedbed sufficiently com pact to hold moisture through the germination period.