VOL. XXII.
INDIANAPOLIS, IND., SATURDAY, APRIL 2,1887.
NO. 14
Level Culture.
Intelligent and wide-awake farmers are
more and more considering the Importance of level culture for the corn plant. A
little reflection should convince anyone of
Its importance, though we are not left to
theory wholly on this subject, for there
have been enough trials of it to show its
great value over ridge and hill methods.
The old way of cultivating corn keeps and
leaves the ground furrowed, obstructing
free and natural root-growth of the plant.
Level culture secures not only natural
growth of the roots, but enables the plant
to readily utilize the plant food of the
atmophere freely circulating at the surface of the thoroughly stirred noil. An
experiment with level culture is reported
in the 1870 volume
of the national department of agriculture, whioh
yielded over 150
bushels of corn per
aore. In the same
series of reports,
Mr. J. F. Wolflng-
er, of Pennsylvania, contributes a
paper to the lStifl
volume, in which
he ably discusses
the methods of
corn culture, and
says:
"If the ground is
inclined to become
dry, lt should be
worked so as to
keep the surface as
level as possible,
thus enabling it to
retain its moisture."
If the corn crop
is cut short, nine
times out of ten
it is caused by dry
weather, and that
is only intensified
by the furrow method of culture. A
very successful
corn grower at
German town, Ohio,
writes: "My plan
Is   to   cultivate   as
level, thus giving the plant free natural
growth and a perfect circulation of the
atmosphere, ladened with its moisture and
plant-food. This implement is bound to
have a great run, and work a large advantage in culture.
Those who have tried lt have had the
most satisfactory results, fully demonstrating what we have always claimed,that
this is the correct system of working the
soil. The letter below from Arad Lap-
man, La Grange, Ind., is but the sentiment
of many such and we give this as Mr. Lap-
man gave the odd and the new system a
careful test. He says: "Last season I purchased one of the Albion Spring-tooth
Cultivators, believing it was built on the
right principal,  and I determined to give
best paying tool I ever purchased and no
farmer can aflord to be without one. They
will pay for themselves every season they
are used."
A great many farmers tried putting in
their oats in this way last season where
they were sown on corn stubble and uniformly had much better crops than where
the ground was plowed and oats put in in
the ordinary way. There is a good reason
for it, as the aotion of the frost pulverizes
the surface and being exposed to the sun
it has warmed tbe top, and if it only can
be worked up mellow, it ia in much better condition for a seed bed, than the cold
ground turned up by the plow. The small
teeth in this cultivator, will go into this
ground where  it is not too hard, and cuts
The Spring-Tooth Cultivator, Manufactured l>\ the Albion Mann Tact tiring Company, Albion, Michigan
While this only cost $40 and does much
better work than any of them, besides
only having one tool to store. Then for
$20 additional a broad cast seeder oan
be put on saving the expense of a grain
drill, costing from (50 to |75, and many
tnink it is better as it distributes the grain
evenly over the ground. This however is
a mooted question, but for such as prefer
seeders, it combines for $20 a better seeder
than ciuld be bought for $40 to 1J50. The
cost of tools is an important feature in
farming, and whoever reduces this cost by
combining tools is a public benefactor,
and in this case this is done not only
without sacrificing some of the good features of each, but making a better tool in.
each place.
Farmers  are apt
-** to be  too  slow to
change from old
method*, hut when
jo ii can raise one
third morn corn to
the acre, that, unt,
third is almost dear
j r Mit, aa it costs no
more to lit u,,,
ground and cultivate tho crop and
only a trlflo
to harvest it, and
no farmer can afford to stick to the
o.'d svs em.
For working hiiiii-
mer fallow, fall
plowing,or putting
in oats or other
spring oropa without plowing the
ground, it is a fine
tool. It has a seeder attachment also
which hows all
kinds of grain,
using the well-
known Hooeierfoed
The cultivator
beams can be taken
out, and a bean
harvester attached
in their place with
which a boy can
easily pull ten acres
in a day. As a
spring-tooth   har-
level as possible," and he reports 105
bushels per acre by this method of culture.
We have referred to these facta Tor the
purpose of calling attention to a comparative new Implement for this work, a oat
of which is given on this page of the
Farmer Tbe Albion Manufacturing Co.,
of Michigan last year first introduced this
Spring Tooth Cultivator, and it was very
thoroughly tested in Ohio, Northern Indiana, Michigan and other Western States.
The reports from Its use last year are universally highly favorable, and in sections
where a dozen were used last season, hundreds are already ordered for this year.
The illustration given very efleotually explains its advantages. It secures the perfection of level cultivation. The spring
teeth are so arranged to stir every inoh of
the soil, instead of covering part of lt, as
in the old way,and yet leaving It perfectly
it a thorough test. Tnrough the field
where I planted my corn, there is a road
used in reaching tbe other fields. On one
side of this road I nsed the Albion all
through the season in working the oorn,
and on the other side used the ordinary
corn plow. The soil was the same, as only
this road separated them, but I found the
corn worked with the Albion did not wilt
and roll up when the dry weather set In,
asltdid where it was worked with the
other plows, and the crop was fully one
third better, so my Albion cultivator more
than paid for itself the first season. 1 also
put in a field of oata with it on old oorn
stubble without plowing, putting In the
centre attachment, and by going over it
twice fitted the ground perfectly, then put
on the seeder attachment and sowed the
oata. I never raised better oats, and It
cost less than half as muoh to put them in
as the ordinary way,   It is by all odds the
it all up fine, while where it is plowed lt
breaks up more or less in lumps. Then they
can as a rule be sown earlier, as many times
the ground gets dry enough to work on
top, and if lt could be li ted quickly the
oats could be put In, but before it can be
plowed and sowed the spring rains oome
on and it is often two or three weeks before it is again dry enough to work, while
if they had been iu the ground they would
have had the benefit of these rains. This
anxiety to get them in early, often leads
farmers to plow their ground when lt Is
too wet and seriously injure their land,
especially In heavy soils. Another valuable feature of tbiH cultivator is the great
variety of uses to which It oan be put. It
combines in one too!
A OMB cultivator which would cost from    pi to |;»
A Field Cultivator disc Harrow or Pulverizer coating from  30 to 36
A Spring-tooth Harrrow   17 to 20
Making a total of |7o      |9o
row it is far ahead of any floating harrow, as it will draw at least one third
easier. There ia no jumping about or
trailing, and it will go into hard ground,
and do the best of work, where they will
do nothing.
We think much of this tardiness,
however, has been for the want of practical tools to carry out the new system,and
the fact that this cultivator has become so
popular wherever introduced, demonstrates that they were ready to adopt level
cultivation when they had a practical tool
to do it with, it is with pleasure we recommend it to our readers, for we thoroughly believe in it, and we were not
surplsed on onr recent visit to their faotory to find them orowded to their utmost
oapaolty to fill orders. We believe it la
just as certain to supercede other systems
of cultivation, aa the Steel and Chilled
Plows have supeisaded Cast Plows.