Farming for self sufficiency

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But in temperate climates the cultivator is more likely to be confronted with grass. What then does he do? If he sprinkles the seed of whatever it is he wants to grow on top of the grass nothing will happen to it except that the birds will eat it. So that is obviously no good. Somehow he must get rid of the grass. Now, either he can skim it off (that is what the old 'breast plough' was for) and remove it and either burn it or let it rot. Or he can bury it. The former course takes much labour, but the latter operation can be done by machinery (i.e. a plough) motivated by animal power or engine. Also it has the advantage that it does not rob the land of nutrients and humus. So he ploughs it. If it is a very small piece of land he digs it, which has the same effect.

He leaves it long enough for the grass to rot. He then probably ploughs it again. He must now get the earth in a soft and workable enough state to be able to put his seed below the surface of the ground where the birds won't get it. So he drags the land about with pointed instruments, such as we rail harrows or cultivators. He goes on doing this until the land is soft enough, and the 'tilth' fine enough (meaning that the bigger clods have been broken up) to make it possible to get his seed in. The smaller the seed the finer the tilth needed. To get his seed in he either scatters it over the surface of the ground and then drags harrows about over it, or hand rakes if it is a small piece of ground, or he drills the seed in. The drill is like a pipe with no back to it which is dragged through the loose soil while the seeds are dropped down the pipe. The pipe opens a furrow, or tiny trench, the seed falls in, and the earth closes in on the seed after the drill has gone past.

Now the seeds begin to grow, but there are sure to be weed seeds in the ground too and they begin to grow also. If the crop is sown very thickly (like wheat) it may grow fast enough to smother the young weeds, and that is all right. If it is not that sort of crop (but is what we call a 'row crop'—like turnips) then the husbandman must give his crop an unfair advantage over the weeds by cutting the weeds out with some implement. Normally this will be a hoe: either a hand hoe or a hoe pulled by a horse or tractor. The latter can only go between the rows of course: only the hand hoe can kill the weeds in the rows between the individual plants. If the weather is dry the weeds he has hoed out will lie on the ground and die. If it rains they will get their roots in again and go on growing. Then the husbandman must hoe them again. It the crop beats the weeds he will have a crop. If the weeds beat the crop he will have only weeds. There is only one crop I know that just does not want weeding at all; and that is the Jerusalem artichoke. This will grow—weeds or no weeds—and make such a dense jungle that it will smother every weed underneath it. Wheat and other corn is sown so thickly, and grows so fast, that it may beat annual weeds, but the land must be fairly clean of perennial weeds (chiefly spear, or couch, grass) otherwise you will not get very much of a crop.

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