Popular Sricfirr Monlhli/ 



737 



The Farm Tractor As an 

 Aid in Road Building 



IN Atkinson, New Hamp- 

 shire, the farm tractor has 

 been successfully used in 

 making and repairing roads, 

 doing away with horses. 



A twenty-horsepower trac- 

 tor, as shown in the picture, 

 was used in conjunction with 

 the regulation road-machine 

 for rounding off the surface 

 of the road and cleaning out 

 gutters. It was found that 

 the tractor not only easily 

 does the work of six or eight 

 horses, but better and in less 

 time. Two men only are required as com- 

 pared with the four required with the 

 former system. Besides, double the ground 

 is covered. 



When the tractor is used with the road- 

 drag, one man, dri\ing the tractor, can 

 round up and- smooth as much State road 

 in half a day as one man with a pair of 

 horses in one day and a half. The tractor 

 hauls four to six cartloads of gravel in the 

 same time that a 

 two-horse team re- 

 quires for one load. 

 Figured in dollars 

 and cents, the trac- 

 tor could easily do 

 $24 worth of work 

 at a cost of only $8, 

 with an additional 

 saving of from 

 twenty-five to fifty 

 per cent in time. 



Trapping the Wise 

 Old Crow 



SINCE time and ex- 

 periment have 

 proved that the aver- 

 age crow is perfectly 

 able to decide whether 

 or not an object in a 

 field can handle a 

 gun, traps to lure the 

 bird are now being 

 tried out. One of the 

 most successful of these 

 traps assumes the formi 

 of a nest fastened se- 



This twenty-horsepower farm tractor proved itself a val- 

 uable and efficient aid in road repairing in Atkinson, N. H. 



curely to the branches of trees, or to any 

 convenient support in the locality to be 

 protected. The nest is made of strong wire 

 mesh, padded in much the same way and 

 with about the same materials as if made 

 by a mother-bird. But the nest rests on a 

 delicately balanced spring which is op- 

 erated by a lever just under the eggs. 

 When the crow gives his first investigating 

 peck, the two sides of the supporting 

 framework of the 

 trap-nest come 

 together like the 

 leaves of a book, with 

 bonecrushing force. 

 Another trap 

 which has proved 

 successful looks like 

 a workman's dinner 

 pail. The cover is 

 turned down, with 

 just enough of an 

 opening left to emit 

 the tantalizing 

 smell of cooked food. 

 With hungry lack of 

 caution, the crow at- 

 tempts to sweep the 

 cover ofif with his foot, 

 the tw^o steel sides 

 of the trap, which he 

 had mistaken for han- 

 dles at the side of the 

 pail, come together 

 and grab him by the 

 leg, holding him with 

 painful effectiveness to 

 await the further venge- 

 ance of the farmer. 



Above are shown various kinds 

 of traps for catching the wily 

 crow. The effectiveness of some 

 depends on his appetite, others 

 on his curiosity. Scarecrows are 

 ineffective — he knows too much 



