120 Implements and Tillage. 



to those soils which can be easily ploughed with two horses 

 in a single plough, and, pending the introduction of a really 

 satisfactory and low-priced agricultural tractor, it is difficult 

 to see how the ploughs of the present age can l)e improved on. 



Cultivators. — The development of the light steel cultivator 

 with spring or semi-rigid tines and renewable points is the 

 chief modern improvement in tillage implements. There were 

 cultivators a hundred years ago, but they were all heavy and 

 unwieldy in construction and working. The modern " sickle 

 tine " cultivator is an indispensable tool on the majority of 

 arable farms. In fallowing foul land where several ploughings 

 are required the use of the cultivator will save at least one 

 ploughing in three, which often means that land can be 

 thoroughly cleaned in time to grow a green crop, which will 

 pay for the cleaning, instead of having a clear fallow. Bare 

 fallows, however, cannot be dispensed with on really heavy 

 clays. It should also be remembered that the very usefulness 

 of these implements tempts one to shirk another ploughing 

 where it is really necessary. Mr. Rider Haggard's pessimistic 

 labourer in A Farmei^'s Year, who said farmers nowadays 

 farmed with the hoe instead of with the plough, put his finger 

 on one of the weak spots of modern tillage. Three or four turns 

 of the cultivator take almost as long as a ploughing, and then 

 do not cut all the thistles. But a double turn of the cultivator 

 across the furrows of the first spring ploughing will practically 

 produce the same result as where the land is ploughed again 

 at once to get a fine enough tilth for harrows to work on. If 

 farmers of Arthur Young's days had had modern cultivators 

 we should not read of three or four ploughings for barley to 

 reduce the clods. It is most important with these cultivators 

 to cross the furrow. Some of them, though keeping their 

 depth till they bring the team to a standstill, have rather much 

 side play, and are apt to " hunt the furrow " when used in the 

 direction of the ploughing. In fact, I know one large hop- 

 grower who has discarded his hop-garden cultivators and 

 returned to the old rigid tine " shim " on this account, for 

 with permanent wirework all hop cultivation must be along 

 the furrows. 



In autumn cultivation the use of these implements has 

 limits. For smashing up a fairly clean bean or pea stubble 

 they are unrivalled, but with much rul)bish the tines choke 

 too much, and even with s})ecially l)road points a better job is 

 made by first ploughing or using a skim plough or other form 

 of broadshare followed by harrows. 



Harrows. — In the report of the trials of implements at the 

 Hull Show in 1873, the judges commented on the difficulty of 

 distinguishing between harrows and cultivators. At the present 



