Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1900-08-24

all day. The next day wagon with a
loader behind will come and the hay VIII
be loaded on to the wagon. taken to the
barn or to the stack and taken off the
wagon with a horse fork. SO you see
the very finest machinery In the world Is
used in the prairie states where the great
staple crops are grown and where the
meats-beef, pork and mutton-are
produced.
wherever machinery can be used the
farmer is using it. The eastern states
are not as we'll adapted as the western
states for the use of machinery. 1t used
TO take man with three or four horses
to run harvester, with five men follow
ing the machine to bind the grain and
two more men to shock. They would
cut about ten acres day. Now two men
will do all that work by the use of the
self-binder-one man now doing the work
that used to be assigned to four, and that
is probably fair average of the value of
labor saving machinery.
"Should YOU visit western farmer, a
man who has been farming for, say,
twenty. i've wears, YOU will find his place
full of cast.off machinery. 1t is com
mon complaint that q western farmer
does not take care of his machinery. But
this is not the explanation. The moment
an improvement is made he wants it.
You Will find original Mccormick ma
chimes in the fence corners, discarded
nothing in use but the latest improve
ments and | will admit that some farm
ers are not as careful with the latest i'll
ventions as they should be, but that /:
another story.
Nobody appreciates an improved ma
chine more than the producers of oul
crops, and 1t is noteworthy fact tina
the improvements come generally from
the farmers themselves. The genera
: impression is that we have an inventive
class who go around studying the needs
of the farmers and prepares to supply
them. This is all wrong. The farmer il
bis own inventor. The manufacturers
get their ideas from the farmers. Ont
of the latest machines is purchased anC
placed in field by a farmer. As hi
operates it imperfectOns become appar
ent. and further avenues of improve
ments are noticed. The farmer then set
about to invent. and the result is that N
tells the manufacturer what should b.
done to perfect the machine. That thi
is rule with farmers is evidenced by tn
fact that improvements are suggested b.
several at practically the same time.
zone of the great problems of lat
years has been to reduce the corn fodde
to convenient shape for animals to use It
that is tearing the fodder TO pieces o
cutting it up. investigation by tn
chemists has demonstrated that tn
stalks are about rs rich at the bottom a
at the top. and the further fact is bein
discovered that it is very difficult to say
the shocks in any condition except in tn
field. The average shock contains abou
~ per cent Of moisture as it stands in tn
field. Hay or corn fodder being stacke6
will not keep more than 20 per cent G
moisture so that convenient machiner
for reducing it as the animals need
during the winter has been in great dc
mand. This is an illustration of no,
improvements come about.
The truck gardener of the south an
along the Atlantic coast uses fine ms
chiuery, but he is compelled 70 Deepen
more upon human hands than the farmer
of the northwest who produce the stapl
{ crops of the country. Down nea
! Charleston, in the strawberry patche;
and III all truck gardens, as well as
the cotton fields throughout the south
= human hands remain in control. the Ii
= Dor being cheap and the nature of tn
work making the adaptation of machiner
to supplant it difficult"