NEW REVOLUTION

Evening Post, Volume CXVIII, Issue 90, 13 October 1934, Page 9

NEW REVOLUTION

IN BRITISH FARMING

DISCOVERY OF THE MACHINE

WHAT IS BEING- DONE

From all quarters there is evidence that farmers aro spending more nionev with the agricultural engineers ■ and implement makers. This is partly due to the fact that there is more money circulating in the- farming industry; last year saw a definite upward trend in many branches of agriculture, writes L. F. Easterbrook in the "Daily Telegraph." But it is also true that makers of farm machinery have now more attractive goods to offer. The past three years havo produced progress in the mechanical equipment for 'tanning unequalled in that period by any other industry. It would hardly be too much to say that agriculture is on the fringe of changes which may prove as far-reach-ing as the Industrial Revolution of over a century ago. This development is in one way even more valuable to agriculture than to the other industries. In addition to reducing the proportion of labour charges in production costs, machinery is enabling the farmer to overcome his old enemy, the weather. This is by far the most important aspect of the matter.. Machinery might allow a farmer to dispense with three men from a staff of twelve—a saving of something under £300 a year. But what is that compared with being able to catch the land nt just the right time for sowing, and so purling another quarter of wheat per acre; of being able to produce malting barley' worth 40s per. quarter instead of feeding barley at 255; or of saving 100 acres of hay, worth £,3 or && per ton, on account of the speed with which it may bo gathered in a "catchy" season? A THOUSAND POUNDS. On a farm employing a dozen men these savings alone might easily run into four figures in a difficult year for weather. The following figures, taken from a "mechanised" farm on the borders of Wiltshire and Hampshire, will give some- idea of tho changes machinery is bringing about in corn farming. They place in comparison the work done by one man with a tractor and one man working with a team of horses:— • One Man and One Stan and Tractor. Horses. Acres. Acres. Ploughing • 6-8 per day % Per day (about) Harrowing . u-7 per hour I*4 per hour Sowing ... 3-5 per hour 1% per hour Eolllng. ... 8-10 per hour 1 per hour If one remembers that there are usually only limited periods every year when conditions are ideal for any of these operations, and that the prospective crop is largely dependent upon taking full advantage of them, the value of speed will be realised. Machinery is making it easier to bo a good farmer. On the particular farm to which the figures quoted refer, tho grain is harvested by a combine harvester-thresher. It used to be regarded as an unsuitable machine foi this country. But ' the farmer in question, having used it for four years, now considers it an essential, adjunct to grain growing in England. Many will not go so far as that, but by threshing the grain at the same time as it is cut it is collected safely once and for all, out of danger of any further weather vagaries. It is safe, too, from the rats and mice that devour perhaps 10 per cent, of it in the rick, and from the damage done by rain penetrating the thatch.i HARVEST AND BAIN. "Wheat has been harvested by "combine" on this farm on a day when 1.03 inches of rain had fallen up to noon, and a perfect miller's sample obtained. ' "Wheat has also been harvested there in the morning and eaten as bread by the harvesters that same evening. To make any of these feats possible mechanical grain driers are required. A few years ago they cost £1200. Now they are obtainable from £100 upwards. They dry wheat up to about 35 per cent, moisture content at a cost of'3d per sack. An alternative method that has been tried recently with every indication of success is threshing in the field with a stationary beater drum fitted with a.-self-feed elevator. One observed test was made with a. field of barley. It was cut, but not tied, by a binder and taken' to the elevator by "sweeps" (pointed poles in series set parallel to the ground) pushed by an old motor-car. An average of 1J acres per hour was thus dealt with, and the moisture con-' tent of the barley after threshing was 19 per cent. ■ Yet another system, introduced two years'ago, is "tripod" harvesting. The method, of stacking the "cocks" around a metal tripod affords a measure of protection against rain and at the same time allows the beneficial effects of sun and wind to have full play. In all the operations of corn growing, therefore, research and engineering are rejroMtionising the work, saving the favnijp a little in labour, but far more by helping him to become very nearly independent of the weather under anything like normal conditions. MORE SPECTACULAR. In.hay-making even more spectacular things are being done. Sometimes the hay is hardly touched by hand at all. Tractor-drawn mowers cut it, machines turn it in the windrows, motor-cars with sweeps in front of them push it to the rick at top speed for .the.ground. There are mechanical, "stackers" that throw the hay from the ground to the top of the rick, half a ton at a time. . But we are not satisfied with this. We have devised a. "combine baler" that picks up hay from . the windrow | and bales it in one. operation. In a recent test the daily output of this machine was up to 15 .tons, and it was baling at times at the.rate of two tons per hour. • Yet even these fundamental changes may in turn become obsolete, in view of the things we are.finding out about grass. Dr. Wooctenan, of Cambridge, has shown that young grass crops, and even weeds, reach their highest feeding value before they come to maximum growth. The feeding value of young grass up 'to eight-twelve inches high is roughly equal to that of linseed cake. If we can harvest it and preserve it at an economic price, the stock-carry-ing capacity of our land might well be doubled, anxiety about tho weather at hay-making time need never trouble the farmer again,, and England with its wonderful climate for grass-growing, permitting two or three crops a season to be taken, would benefit more than any other country. DRYING NEEDED. A machine has been successfully invented for harvesting grass of this short length. That part is all right. It only remains to devise an economic means of drying the young grass. We are now on the brink of achieving that. It is already being claimed that grass can be dried and preserved in this way at a cost of £4 per ton, which would be an economic price.

A gras3-drying machine for use by the ordinary farmer has been made for under £300. It is not on the market yet, for it is going through exhaustive tests, bui..there.is^no'-doutrt that it will come. Formerly' tins cheapest plant for

this purpose ran into thousands of pounds. When ' the. economic grassdrier arrives it may save us importing some 15,000,000 tons of feeding stuffs. These aro the moro spectacular things that are "being clone by the engineers, scientists, and farmers themselves to revolutionise agriculture. There arc a host' of others, such as mechanical milking machines; tractors with adjustable wheels for working between rowcrops; transplanting machines that set out young plants at many times the speed of the human hand; potato and beet lifting machines; roto-tillers for the market gardener, that enable six men to do the work of ten. LABOUR DISPLACED. There aro implements driven by a direct power take-off from the tractor, giving better work and saving many of the breakdowns at critical moments, far more costly in time than in the actual cost of repair. . One question inevitably, arises. -Is not all this substitution of machinery for hand labour adding to the unemployment problem? But that is-not a question which applies peculiarly to farming. It is a question that faces the whole of civilisation, and no one has yet found the proper answer. So far as farming, is concerned, it would bo as sensible to abolish the mower and binder and compel the population to turn out from mid-July to mid-October to harvest our crops with sickle and scythe, as it would be to refrain at this stage from taking full advantage of what the engineers can do for us. '

There is no special reason why agriculture should be made a working museum of obsolete practices. To put back the clock, even if we could, is an admission of defeat.

Alternatively, it does not follow that the development of machinery in farming will necessarily mean less employment on the" land. When corn and other feeding stuffs can.be grown on the spot so cheaply tho farmer, is encouraged to increase the livestock which will ent them. He mny keep pigs and poultry where 'formerly he only grew corn and kept sheep. When the Yorkshire hand-loom gave place to textile machinery, employment increased beyond what anyone had thought . possible. Lord Lymington, who has'gonc further than most in "mechanising" his corn growing and dairy farming, told me a year ago that his farms were then producing more fnod and employing moro men than over .before in their history.