PLANTING ARID LAND

Press, Volume XCIII, Issue 28008, 30 June 1956, Page 7

PLANTING ARID LAND

NEW MACHINE DEVISED

Many instruments have been devised to cultivate the soil in arid regions, where the mouldboard plough and other such inventions of humid regions have proven absolutely unsuited to the regional needs of water-con-servation.

These fall into two general classes: ploughs to stir the soil up from below without disturbing the surface —leaving the mulch and surface vegetation undisturbed—and those which dent or pit the soil so as to provide “millions of little lakes” in which the water of scanty rains may gather to sink into the soil.

Now a new variant of such a machine. and among the most promising of all, has been devised by the University of Wyoming’s agricultural engineering research staff. It is an all-purpose tool. Drawn by a powerful tractor, it prepares the soil, plants seed, and places fertiliser, all in one operation.

An Effective Point It does this in two rows, but leaves a 22-inch strip of native vegetation untouched between rows. This is to check wind erosion, since surface dust needs a smooth “runway” like an aeroplane, if it is to mount into the air. In the present version, it would simply roll or blow into the central strip and stop. Tests show also that the centre strip will produce as much forage for grazing, as if untouched by the machine.

The machine has two sweeps, or chisel-ploughs, on each side, one five inches above the other. The top one goes ahead and skims off surface growth, the bottom one follows, pulverises the soil, and makes a seed bed about four inches deep. Funnels deliver seed and fertiliser into this bed. Tests so far indicate that, excluding the cost of fertiliser, the cost of planting an acre in this way is about 25s in New Zealand currency. This feature of relative cheapness also appeals to dryland farmers.