The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1886-12-17
DITCHING m WINTER.
Work Which Will Certainly Pay the Farm
er Whose Land Needs Draining.

Work Which Will Certainly Pay the Farm
er Whose Land Needs Draining.
Few farmers can get around with the
other work-the regular farm work.
such as husking. blowing, getting out
manure, etc.-in time to do what ditch
ing they had planned to do before
freezing-up time. There is much bad
weather in late autumn, the days are
short. and constantly getting shorter;
and there are innumerable little putter-
ing jobs to be done about the stables.
yards, gardens, orchards and cellars.
No matter how big a margin of time the
farmer has figured for himself. he sell
dom finds much spare time for works of
improvement about the farm before
freezing-Up time, unless he hires an in
creased amount of outside help.
Now great deal of ditching can be
done in early winter. after the ground
has frozen and snow covers the ground
to such an extent that farmers have gem
orally piled away the tools for the win
ter. have dug. considerable ditch af-
ter heavy freezing-up and with a good
coat of snow On the ground.
A little preparation before freezing
occurs is necessary; however. if the
work would be expeditiously carried on.
In the first place the location OF the pro-
posed bitches should be determined up
on, and the lines staked out Then
take pillow and throw out two or three
burrows, blowing as deep as the beam
will allow by repeatedly running the
pillow deeper down along the same fur
row. II tile is to be laid, or almost any
underground drain, one good wide fur.
row will give sufficient width. Iffor an
open ditch wide ut the top, il will ba
necessary to throw burrows both WAYS.
and thus make an opening trench OF
three feet width o. such a matter. This
saves an immense amount of hand latOr
in any case, no matter when the ditch
ing is to be dond, and in preparing for
winter ditching it is absolutely neces-
sary in order to save the expense and
tedious labor of cutting through the
frozen crust of top earth.
To keep the earth from freezing in the
bottom of this trench, fill it up with
strawy manure, and spread some along
on the surface each side of the trench
Hauling the manure or straw for this
purpose, is not labor lost BY any means
aside from its nse in the ditca. 1t can
be applied to the adjoining land along
the line of the Gtch as cheaply as il
could be pitched from the manure cart
or from piles, so that part of the opera
ton should hardly be charged up to tho
ditch. 1t will be noticed that the bot
tom of a trench of this kind does no:
freeze very readily without any protec-
ton. A foot depth of straw manure IN
it will effectually prevent any freezing
where the after digging IS
TO be carried on
Two men and \ team will Law out halt
. winters work in this way in q very
short time. As the hand digging pro-
crosses the filling is removed few feet
at q time, throwing it well back, that it
may not be covered BY the earth that is
to follow. BY uncovering but q few
feet of the trench at q time the work
may be carried on in the coolest weather
without any loss of time in cutting
through frost.
Where underdrains are being laid it
Is good plan to keep the whole thing
well finished up 10 where the digging Is
going on That is, lay the drain,
whether it be board or tile, well up to
the dggers, and fill in as fast as laid
and leysled.
Men can be had almost for their
board in many sections of the country
during the winter months II Will Ger
tainly pay the farmer whose land needs
draining to push the work at such .
time. The days may be short. and
there may be lots of chores to be done.
but few rods of ditch done each dey
viii count on next years crop. and for
all succeeding cropA-W D. Boystos.
IL Okio F0ruaeZ.