NEWARK, Del. Today’s grain producers have many tillage alternatives. Choosing the best system to maximize profits while minimizing erosion isn’t always easy. The moldboard plow is still the best tool for covering sod or trash while pulverizing the topsoil, says University of Delaware extension agricultural engineer Tom Williams. It buries many potential weed, insect, and disease problems but leaves the land exposed to erosion. The chisel plow stirs and pulverizes the topsoil while leaving ridges and furrows and some surface residue to reduce erosion. AIR BLAST SPRAYER KEY FEATURES: • 55 gallon poly tank • 12 1 /? HP (210 c c )gas engine • 8 nozzle adjustable discharge, 200 mph velocity • Calibration from 1 quart to 40 gal per acre • Up to 40 ft swath width for crops •Up to 40 ft height with Teleblast • Mounts on 3pt hitch or skids into pick up truck SOLD AND SERVICED BY: LESTER A. SINGER Lancaster County’s Only Dealer Specializing in Sprayer Sales & Service RONKS, PA 717-687-6712 Mon.-Fn. 8 to 5; Sat. 9 to 12 ALL WORK - ALL DA Y When work’s the game, Big Red is the name. Shaft Drive - Reverse gear - Electric Start Front and Rear racks - Tow a 700 lb. payload So if you’re looking for a working machine that can help do the chores at a fraction of the purchase and operating costs of most utility vehicles, take a look at Honda’s Big Red. It’ll do some heavy-duty hauling on a very lightweight budget U. of Del. compares costs of tillage It’s cheaper to operate than the moldboard plow, provided secondary tillage isn’t increased to prepare the seedbed, says Williams. Various disk implements are available for cutting surface residue and shallow tillage, while subsoilers can till up to 2 feet deep where compacted subsoils impede root development. Then there’s no-tillage, which offers growers some attractive alternatives to plowing the soil. It helps conserve soil moisture, reduce soil temperatures and decrease soil erosion by both wind and water. But most attractively, it reduces labor, machinery and fuel requirements, three expensive inputs. This system has allowed fanners to expand their cropped acreage without having to increase their machinery investment substantially, the specialist says. The University of Delaware Cooperative Extension Service and Agricultural Experiment Station began field studies in 1973 to compare the differences in machine energy requirements for various tillage systems to grow com on Coastal Plain soils. Williams presented a summary of this research at the annual Mid- Atlantic No-Till Conference in Timonium, Md., last December. “We started with two In ternational Harvester 656 gas tractprs with a vacuum gauge on the intake manifolds calibrated Ford 201 and 202 mounted harrows... economy models that do the job • Flexo-hitch lift-type follows ground contours like a shadow. • Widths 6Vz to 10-feet • 16 or 18-inch notched or plain blades • White iron or anti-friction bearings •6 to 30 ft. Lift & Pull IBsa ALLEN H. MATZ, INC. ' *' 505 E. Main St., New Holland Ph: 717-354-2214 _ SERVING THE COMMUNITY ) f THIRTY-FOUR YEARS LANC CO S OLDEST FORD DEALER Ti deters Equipment against a PTO dynamometer and fuel meter,” Williams said. “This gave us engine horsepower and fuel u>e in the field.” A drawbar dynamometer provided implement draft requirements. “That first year we found that 60 horsepower-hours per acre were required for moldboard plowing, one disking, one springtoothing and planting on a loamy sand soil,” he said. Substituting a chisel plow for the moldboard plow lowered the requirements to 46 horsepower hours per acre, whereas no-till com planting required only 8.6 one-seventh of the moldboard plow system. No-till also took only about a sixth of the fuel and a third of the labor of the moldboard plow system. Chisel plowing saved 1.1 gallons of fuel per acre and 0.21 hours an acre over moldboard plowing. These figures don’t in clude spraying. “By 1974 we were able to obtain a 97 PTO HP Minneapolis Moline G 955 diesel tractor with more sophisticated instrumentation for these machine system com parisons,” Williams said. Using this, the relationships between no-till and chisel plow systems were ver similar to those obtained with the gas tractors. Chisel plowing required 40.6 more horsepower-hours per acre, 3.25 more gallons per acre of diesel fuel, and 0.45 more hours of labor than the no-till planter. This comparison also didn’t include spraying, which would slightly lower the difference, since no-till generally requires a larger volume of spray material per acre than clean tilled soil. University of Delaware agricultural engineers have also evaluated the inputs and yields for subsoiling to a depth of 15 inches in the row at planting. “Draft increased as speed and depth of subsoiling increased, with inclined shanks requiring less draft than parabolic shanks,” Williams reported. “Subsoiling could require up to 35 additional tractor PTO horsepower per row or shank. Benefits of in-row sub soiling on Coastal Plain soils have ; CALL US FOR FREE ESTIMATES 2 on TOP QUALITY BARN SPRAY & BRUSH PAINTING t Try Our New Concept In Penetration And Adhesion. | In 1983 i To earn a dollar give a dollars worth of service and work Pay only $750 for the best kind of barn painting on an average barn if you pay more you paid too s ' much On barn siding painting temperature and timing are factors as well as f' penetrating kind of quality for adhesion are helpful guides for long lasting under " average conditions of siding type and age ' * I will share helpful guidelines on roof maintenance of steel roofs by brushing on at prime time ' The farmers in Lancaster Co. are lucky because of the amount of competition in barn painting. Check with us for the best deal! I PHARES S. HURST Years of experience plus self | RD 1, Box 420, Narvon, PA 17555 employment gives you quality 215-445-6186 work for less expense. incaster Farming, Saturday, March 24,1984—P31 been highly variable in both no-till and clean tilled systems. No-till, however, has averaged about a 7 percent increase in yields over clean tilled systems. Yields are usually increased in dry years because of moisture con servation.” The savings no-till offers in machine energy, fuel and labor can have a number of economic implications in a farming operation. “Saving over 3 gallons of diesel fuel an acre is perhaps not as critical now as during the energy crisis, but the $1 per gallon saved can help pay for the additional chemicals required,” he said. Saving 0.4 hours of labor per acre can be a cash saving of another $3 per acre at a labor rate of |7.50 an hour. However, he pointed out, this is no saving unless the labor is put to another productive use such as planting more acres. The biggest savings with no-till come from reduced machinery investment over a period of time. “You have to decide what this can mean to your operation,” Williams said. “New tractors currently sell for about $4OO per PTO HP. If no till allows you to eliminate a 100 HP tractor, that’s $40,000 less capital investment. With another $lO,OOO less for tillage implements, your fixed machinery costs may drop $l5 to $2O per acre.” From 1980 through 1982, farm machinery depreciation in the U.S. exceeded investment by a total of $ll billion. “Certainly most of this came from delayed purchases because of depressed farm in come. However, some must have resulted from increased con servation and no-tillage prac tices,” the specialist said. “In a comparison of machine systems, no-tillage will win out every time because fewer machines are required,” Williams concluded. “Many other factors must be considered as well, when a cropping system is analyzed. But in the final analysis, one thing seems sure, there will be more no till in’B4.” BRUNING .■] WV.V.. i,
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers