IMPROVEMENTS IN PLOUGHS AND PLOUHGING.

Clutha Leader, Volume IV, Issue 189, 22 February 1878, Page 7

IMPROVEMENTS IN PLOUGHS AND PLOUHGING.

,A."A;The. Australasian in referring to a treble-furrow plough, the production of •Messrs Thomas Henderson and Co., of Hotham, thus writes of ploughs and -ploughing : — "Tt hasbee.n frequently f remarked in our columns that thn tenL -dency amongst Victorian ploug-h- --„ makers has been to regard every addition to the length of the mould-board .as. an improvement in the implement. To this assumption -we have invariably L taken exception, and have endeavoured A to. show that, other conditions being equal, each extension of mould-board involved the loss of a greater amount of animal power in draught. It should have been obvious to ploughmakers A that by augmenting tho length of the body they would require to lengthen

prbportionately the stilts, and also to

7 make every part stronger and heavier. It followed also that the longer the body the greater the friction of the "mould-board and landside against the soil, so that no surprise should have been felt that the draught of the fashionable long-bodied wheelless implements known as Scotch swing ploughs Ayas nearly double that of the shortbodied ploughs employed in the southmidland, and western counties of England. How the Americans adhere to -shortA inouldboards is well known, and the advocates of long-bodied ploughs have made much of the fact of the for-

mer being incapable of winning prizes £t a match against theirs. Were prizes at ploughing matches the aim and end of ploughing, their objection to short mould-boards would possess some point, but matches are not necessarily conducive to good husbandry, and have often, indeed, a contrary tendency. We are free to admit that the introduction of double-furrow ploughs has done much towards those mistakes which the old prize ploughing* system was calculated to engender. The farmer who hires a double-furrow ploughman has rarely occasion "to teach him to plough for a crop," as those who hired champion ploughmen of the old school used to declare was necessary. The work made by double-furrows generally is stronger and better calculated to fulfil the farmer's objects than the single-fur-rowed work to which the prizes were awarded. The triple -furrowed plough which has led to these commeuts is re-, markable as being a step in the direction of shorter mouldboards. The reduction in the length of the bodies will be understood when we sa^ that tbis triple-furrowed implement is actually two feet shorter than an ordinary double-furrow plough. It will evidently be easier of management, ancl in crab-holey land or ground otherwise uneven, it will have many advantages over the longer-bodied ploughs. w e are assured that this implement will be easily worked with three horses at the ordinary depth, and in soil in fair condition. If this be fully borne out ih practice, a saving in labour as compared with double-furrow ploughs will be effected equal to half the cost of a man — no unimportant item in these days, when hands worth having are so hard to obtain at any price. The im - plement manufactured by Messrs Henderson possesses fhe further advantage of being capable of alteration at will into a double-furrow plough, a matter of convenience when the soil, as at presen •, is so hard, or at any time in breakingup new land. An implement drawn by

three horses and driven by one man, which will plough four acres a day in furrows 9in by sin, will be sure to meet

with the approval of many. But the proper direction for improvement having been indicated, shall we not be permitted to record' at no distant date

further movements towards reducing tbe draught and increasins,* theefficiencv

of our ploughs, and thus lessening the cost of the operation of plouiyhing ?