30 



BULLETIN 320, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



for the city trade. These mares average about 1,400 pounds in 

 weight, which permits the use of large implements and requires little 

 man labor. 



After the land is broken the seed bed is usually prepared with a 

 4-horse disk harrow, followed by a corrugated roller (fig. 26), and 



Pig. 26. — A corrugated roller or pulverizer, an im- 

 plement used in Moultrie County, 111., and other 

 sections of the Middle West. 



Pig. 27. — A 2-horse disk cul- 

 tivator used in cultivating 

 corn in Moultrie County, 111. 



this is followed by a spike-tooth harrow. This leaves the land prac- 

 tically level and in very fine conditino. Planting is done in most 

 cases with a 2-row edge drop planter in checks 3^ feet apart each 

 way, alternating the hills with two and three grains. 



While the corn is coming up, or right after it gets up, the field is 

 harrowed once or twice with a spike-tooth smoothing harrow. If 



the field is cloddy, a corrugated 

 roller is used before the harrow. 

 After this harrowing most of the 

 cultivating is done with a 2-horse 

 6-shovel cultivator or a 2-horse 

 disk cultivator (fig. 27) . Usually 

 three or four cultivations are 

 given in alternate directions. A 

 type of implement known as the 

 surface cultivator (fig. 28) is fre- 

 quently used, especially for the 

 last cultivation. This implement, 

 instead of having shovels, is 

 equipped with four long sweeps, 

 which are very similar to the 

 knives of a stalk cutter. These 

 sweeps run two on either side of the row and about 1 inch deep. 

 They are set at an angle to the soil of about 45°. The sweeps cut 

 off and destroy the weed growth much more effectively than do the 

 shovels. 



Fig. 28. — A type of surface cultivator 

 equipped with four long sweeps for stir- 

 ring the soil, used for corn tillage in 

 Moultrie County, 111., and other sections 

 of the Middle West. 



