HARVESTING 97 



Practically all threshing in the United States is now done by 

 steam. The musical hum of the machines, which could be 

 heard for miles, and which possessed a peculiar fascination that 

 always charmed the threshermen, accompanied the sweep pow- 

 ers with gearing and tumbling rods to their oblivion. The side 

 gear driving the cylinder of the separator made most of the 

 noise. When this gear was cut off to give place to the belt 

 pulley, the noise was reduced to a minimum, although the hum 

 of the cylinder is still maintained. A few farmers own their 

 own machines, but generally the threshing is done for a stated 

 price per bushel by the itinerant outfit. In some sections the 

 farmers still exchange work in the threshing, while in others 

 the whole crew travels with the outfit. The farmer then simply 

 takes care of the grain. On the smaller farms, 500 to 1000 

 bushels are threshed per day. 



On the large farms, whether the grain is bound or headed, the 

 last day of harvesting is the first day of threshing. If bound, 

 the grain is not stacked, as it generally is on the smaller farms, 

 but is threshed from the field. It is usually considered fit to 

 thresh after it has cured in the shock for about ten days. When 

 wheat is stacked, it begins to ' 'sweat' 7 about three days after 

 stacking, and the process is over in about three or four weeks. 

 It has been claimed that this is beneficial to the wheat in that 

 it is fed from the straw, and that the berries thus become 

 plumper and heavier and also acquire a better color. English 

 writers seem to say nothing concerning this process of sweat- 

 ing. The northwestern wheat growers of the United States 

 claimed that the wheat would sweat in the bin if this process 

 had not taken place in the stack before threshing. When it is 

 dried by seasonable cutting and threshing, however, it is very 

 questionable if it can sweat or heat in the bin. 1 



The Modern Threshing Machine has a self-feeder, a band- 

 cutter, and an automatic straw-stacker. There are also auto- 

 matic weighing attachments. The grain is pitched upon the 

 self-feeder, and the machine performs all the other operations. 

 There are two forms of automatic stackers, the swinging stacker 

 with rake to elevate the straw, and the wind stacker, in which 

 the straw is forced through a long air-tight chute by a blast 



1 TJ. S. Dept. Agr., Spec. Kept. No. 40, p. 30; Hunt, Cereals in 

 America (1904), p.107. 



