i88 Our Farming. 



With a little care and skill I managed to dig clean and pretty 

 well with this tool, where there were no small stones. These 

 would bother a good deal. The potatoes were laid out on top of 

 ground in nice shape for picking up. 



After a time it was said the patent on the McCallum expired 

 through some default not making a second payment on a patent 

 taken out in Canada, I think, which annulled the patent in this 

 country. Then Hoover and Prout went to improving on the 

 machine, and sent their make out under the name of the Hoover 

 digger. After struggling along some years with a McCallum, I 

 procured a Hoover. This is now made so stones do not bother 

 much, and under reasonable conditions, with four horses on, or 

 perhaps three, one can dig well and fast. There is no better 

 digger on earth to-day that I know of. Of course, it is somewhat 

 complicated, and in blundering hands it would soon come to grief, 

 like many other good tools we have. But if one keeps it in good 

 order, well oiled, and is careful, the wear and tear need be very 

 slight on reasonably clean, mellow land. I have dug an acre in 

 two hours, with long rows and conditions all right. This is 

 nearly ten times as fast as expert hand digging, and twenty times 

 what common hands would do. Late years I have done all my 

 digging myself, without paying out anything, and put my men to 

 picking up. When we are in a hurry to get them out for wheat, 

 as we always are, the digger is a great help, as we can rush the 

 job as we never could get the help to do by hand. But now let 

 me tell you just what you may expect of the digger. It will not 

 do good work going along a side hill. It will do all right going 

 up hill always, and straight down hill if the grade is moderate. 

 On all level and gently rolling land it will do nicely. I would 

 not buy one to use in a very stony or gravelly field. It will go 

 through such spots, but the wear and tear will likely be too heavy. 

 On a clean, mellow, level field, it will do your eyes good to see how 

 nicely it will transfer the tubers to the surface. With the varieties 

 that grow compactly in the hill, which we raise always, it will 

 get every one except small ones, provided you put on power 

 enough to run deep enough, and your rows are straight, and you 

 keep the digger under them. This is not hard to do. Very few 

 are cut and these are not injured as much as those stuck by hand 

 digging. Most varieties will not bruise any to hurt when fully 

 ripe. I found a variety once that would bruise and crack from 

 contact with the iron of digger. They were exceedingly tender. 

 I have never dug any green potatoes with a digger. I should 

 expect them to bruise some. I have never used the weed and 

 vine turner. Took it off before starting digger. We do not 

 mean to raise weeds, and the dead vines do not bother much, 

 going right over with the potatoes. I use two teams on digger, 

 one ahead of the other, as I want to take one off to use in draw- 

 ing in. Three good horses abreast would be power enough. 



