Haying with Less Help

Haymaking in Iowa usually comes piling in on top of several other jobs. In this time of war with a shortage of workers, farmers will be casting about for the best way to get their haying done with less help

Labor, power and machinery in corn production

Commercial corn production cannot be carried on by hand methods; it can be done only with machinery. Operating costs in corn production greatly depend upon the efficiency of labor, power and machinery management. Results obtained in a study of the use of labor, power and machinery at Ames are as follows: Raking and burning cornstalks before plowing in preparing a seedbed for corn required .47 man-hour of labor and .38 tractor-hour of power per acre and appeared to be largely a waste of labor and power. Cutting stalks with a stalk cutter before plowing required .23 hour per acre for man and tractor with no apparent benefit. Disking before plowing took .25 hour per acre for man and tractor and seemed to be of doubtful value

Weed control in growing corn

A study of machinery for growing and harvesting corn has been carried on at Ames, Iowa, since 1931 by the Agricultural Engineering Section, Iowa Agricultural Experiment Station, cooperating with the Bureau of Agricultural Chemistry and Engineering, U. S. Department of Agriculture. Experiments were conducted on the Agricultural Engineering Research Farm at Ames. This farm comprises soils in the Webster and Clarion Series, and the topography is comparatively level. Maximum slopes are about 5 percent. The purpose of this bulletin is to report the results of these experiments insofar as they relate to the methods and machinery best adapted for controlling weeds in surface-planted corn. Recent improvements in machinery enable the corn grower to produce his crop with less labor than was formerly required and to improve the control of weeds in cornfields. Machinery, labor and power for producing corn have been discussed in a previous publication. Improving weed control is the principal objective under consideration in the present bulletin

Prospectus, April 5, 1995

https://spark.parkland.edu/prospectus_1995/1010/thumbnail.jp