[AT] here I go again

[charlie hill]

Dean,  having seen some of both, I'm pretty certain you'd be able to adapt 
to todays
methods a lot better than the young guys would be able to adapt to the ways 
we did
it half a century ago.   That said,  I think no-til and low-til farming is a 
wonderful thing.
The days of blowing dirt in the March winds are all but over.

If you really want to see some fancy farming go to you tube and look for 
Australian farming
videos.   There are several on there taken at huge farms down under.   I 
wish I could go down
there and hang around for a season and see what they do and how they do it. 
I hear there
is a program that allows you to get a visa to work on farms there for a 
season and then do
some touring for 30 days or so after the season is over but I guess they 
probably don't want
a 64 year old guy!  lol.

Charlie

-----Original Message----- 
From: Dean VP
Sent: Thursday, July 31, 2014 1:17 AM
To: 'Antique tractor email discussion group'
Subject: Re: [AT] here I go again

Ron,

Well Done.. it is this kind of knowledge that is being lost with our 
generation.  Having been born and
raised maybe 60 miles further north in NW Iowa I fully appreciate the unique 
requirements in flat
river bottom land vs what we called gently rolling land. There were stark 
differences in what was
required to prepare the land, plant the crop and do what was necessary to 
try to control the weeds in
this era. Herbicides have changed everything you and I grew up with. 
Round-Up didn't exist and for
sure Round-Up ready Corn and Beans didn't exist in this period you are 
referring to.  We worked the
land to death trying to keep the weeds in check. Your area's problem was 
complicated by the flat land
and potential of too much moisture. Our issue was to keep the soil in place 
when there was too much
moisture and on the opposite side of the scale was to try to retain moisture 
when there wasn't enough
of it.  Each area had its unique challenge. Then multiply that by all the 
varying geographic
differences around the country.  The major agricultural schools around the 
country, Iowa State being
one of them, had their hands full trying to guide the farmers to achieve 
maximum production.
Herbicides changed everything and then came along "No-Till" farming.  I 
would not know where to start
with today's farming methods.  Not much of what I learned in my 18 years on 
the farm applies today
other than understanding the risks involved.

Dean VP
Snohomish, WA

They say necessity is the mother of invention.
Don't know who the father is, probably remorse.
Red Green

-----Original Message-----
From: at-bounces at lists.antique-tractor.com 
[mailto:at-bounces at lists.antique-tractor.com] On Behalf Of
Ron Cook
Sent: Wednesday, July 30, 2014 9:56 PM
To: Antique tractor email discussion group
Subject: Re: [AT] here I go again

John,
     You should have tried convincing the agronomy professor at Iowa
State University that it was done that way.  Get you a near failing
grade.  I know.   The major implement manufactures all made the listers
and the cultivators that went with them, so it had to have been done in
other parts of the country where dry conditions prevailed.  It was
prevalent here from probably the early 1900's with horses and tractors
by the thirties on until around 1970.  It still has not completely
disappeared, though.  I plant my sweetcorn with a lister.  Not very
deep, mind you.  But it is the only mechanical planter I own and is
better than a stick poking holes in the ground.  My nephew didn't know
what it was that was taking up space in a shed he wanted to use and was
going to scrap it.  So, I plant my sweetcorn with a lister, 4 rows at a
time.  Silly, but fun.  I also use it to bed the potato rows.  It is a
bedder, to start with anyway and I don't currently have a potato planter
and likely never will.  That actual planting I do by hand.
     A cultipacker would be a big no-no here in these soils. Compaction
is the enemy.  You need to stay off the soil in the spring as much as
possible.  No spring plowing either.  That is another reason for the
lister.  The soil displaced by the furrow covers the weeds, etc with the
ridge.  After emergence, the sides of the ridges are cultivated with the
cultivators discs and the shovels cultivate either side of the row with
shovels.  Then the cultivator is changed so the next cultivation discs
the ridges into the row to cover the weeds and grasses growing in the
row.  From then on you would use a cultivator like you would have.
Sweeps and hillers. Probably only once or maybe twice with that outfit.
Chemicals stopped most of that tillage work and the fields became much
cleaner and the yields greater.  No, or reduced tillage methods have
practically eliminated the use of the cultivator and for sure eliminated
the lister planter.  Anyone younger than I might not even be able to set
one of the things to work correctly.
     These methods were only used on the flat river bottom land.  Not in
any hilly or rolling ground.  Plumb flat.  A wet year caused many
problems, too.  I had those problems with my sweetcorn patch this year
as a reminder of times past.
     There is a little information here,
http://www.livinghistoryfarm.org/farminginthe30s/machines_06.html
Here is a photo of a Super C and lister.
http://www.yesterdaystractors.com/cgi-bin/viewit.cgi?bd=farmall&th=863435
Ron Cook
Salix, IA
On 7/30/2014 8:27 PM, jtchall at nc.rr.com wrote:
> I have NEVER heard of anyone planting anything like that! Definitely 
> learned
> something. Anybody ever try pulling a cultipacker? Looks like that would
> have done the job without packing the land so tight on top of the seed.
> Looking at some of the modern planters with the combination of coulters,
> press wheels, row openers, row closers, and trash cleaners, its been quite
> the evolution in planting equipment over the last 50 years.
>
> John
>

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