What Happened to Row Crop Farming????

Bill VA · Apr 20, 2015

I see these old videos of Farmall H and Deere 2 cylinder tractors outfitted with mid-mount and sometimes front mount cultivators - tooling down the fields, cultivating. I gather the farmers are knocking out weeds, maybe side dressing or hilling the crop or maybe all three. I assume round-up ready crops like corn were not invented at that time and some kind of cultivation was necessary and a tractor with cultivators was the way to go in absence of some chemical solution and faster/lower cost than a team of men with hoes in hand or a horse with culitvator.

But then in the very late 50's and early 60's - something changed. Deere and IH go big on their tractors, i.e. Deere 4020, IH 806, etc. Wide front ends. Was this the end of crop cultivation by a row crop tractor? I can't say I've ever seen a midmount or front mount cultivator on these tractors.

What happened??????

What caused the narrow front tractors like the Farmall H tractors to no longer be needed on the farm? Did row crop cultivating stop with these new bigger tractors? Surely round-up ready corn wasn't around at the time? How did the farmer control weeds, etc., with these new larger tractors and aside from products like round-up ready corn, how do they effectively keep the weeds to a minimum today?

Just curious.

Thanks!
Bill

crooked rows · Apr 20, 2015

most went to three point hitch rear mounted cultivators

Carlyle hoffman · Apr 20, 2015

Spraying, and Tractors became to HEAVY on the front end, breaking narrow front PEDESTALS and sinking in soft ground.

Aaron SEIA · Apr 20, 2015

They went to rear mounted or wider front mounted. I'm pretty sure you could get an 8 or 12 row front mount cultivator from IH and JD. Herbicides in general started showing up then as well. Roundup isn't the only thing that'll kill weeds. Today it's nearly 100% herbicide weed control. I'll go out on a limb and guess not much corn is really treated with Roundup. Lot of other options out there.
AaronSEIA

JCCWI · Apr 20, 2015

3pt cultivators and spraying took over. Atrazine has been around a long time....late 50ies if I'm remembering right.

John

armand tatro · Apr 20, 2015

Also the combines with corn heads took over the corn harvesting so mounted corn pickers (which required a tractor with a narrow front) ceased to be needed to be needed to harvest corn. I do know of a few I H 7 and 806's and a few J D 30 and 4020's that had corn pickers mounted on them. Armand

Bill(Wis) · Apr 20, 2015

Between spraying with such products as atrazine, etc., and planting in 30" rows (no need to accommodate for the 42" width of a horse anymore) which canopied over earlier and wider rear mount cultivators the farmers just stopped buying narrow front tractors. John Deere and Int still offered them. You will find an occasional 4020 with a narrow front.

T in NE · Apr 20, 2015

Looked at a cherry 966 about 15 years ago. Farmer bought it new and put a 3 pt cultivator on it. Never unhooked it and his daughter was the only one who ran it.

Brendon-KS · Apr 20, 2015

I have a Deere brochure from 1992 that still has a mid-mount cultivator - it is pictured on a 4250 and a 4440. But, as others have said, the rear-mounted style became a lot more popular in the '60's and then later herbicides made cultivating largely obsolete except for organic crops and vegetables.

Tom OConnor · Apr 20, 2015

As others have said, Atrizine and Round-up ready beans played a big roll in changing farming patterns along with narrow rows and combine corn headers came with stripper plates above the snapping rolls that eliminated nearly all the waste of the old pickers that left several bushels of corn on the ground. The late fiftys and early sixtys brought a lot of changes that contributed in different ways. The grain dryers were also a big factor that put ear corn in the back ground. Rear mounted cultivators took the place of the front mounted. Matter of fact I still have a eight row in the barn that hasn't been out in thirty years. If anybody needs one let me know.

TomA in CA · Apr 20, 2015

I got a good look at farming methods yesterday as I made the trip from the west coast of California across the central valley to the foothills on the east side. It seems like everything is some sort of ridge till now. All the tillage is done with big wheel tractors with specially made 3 pt sleds. Over by Watsonville there was a lot of rough looking ground. I can't see how they get anything to grow in ground like that. That country is a lot of direct seeded leaf lettuces and greens. In the Valley there was a lot of direct seeded crops coming up. I think some was cotton. There was many acres of tomatoes about 3 inches tall, I don't know if they are direct seeded or transplanted. I did not see any corn, I think it is too early yet. Even with the drought there was a lot of flood irrigation going on. Many of the orchards are on drip now. Lots of Almonds. There are many different irrigation districts. Some have water and some have none.

Goose · Apr 20, 2015

When I was a teenager in the late 1940's and early 1950's, we controlled weeds and insects with cultivation and crop rotation.

I joined the Marine Corps, and by the time I left the Corps ten years later chemicals had taken over. No young farmer was considered up and coming, and worthy of renting land to, unless he regularly drenched his crops in all manner of chemicals. Now, 50 years later, all of these same farmers are dying off from all sorts of weird cancers.

Is there a connection?

John730D · Apr 20, 2015

Tractors went to wide front because they no longer needed to have cornpickers mounted on the tractor. Combines were the downfall of narrow front tractors. Wide fronts were safer and bigger tires meant they wouldn't get stuck in the mud as easy. I have also seen front mount cultivators on wide front tractors.

IaGary · Apr 20, 2015

Yup they are in their late 70's and 80's and dying off.

After all there parents made it to their 60's with no chemicals.

The University of Iowa did a study with farmers and chemicals. They found no more illness in the farmers that worked with chemicals then the general public. This study was started 20 years ago and is still on going last I knew. I was in it for 10 years.

Gary

notjustair · Apr 20, 2015

What a coincidence! That's how we always took care of the sedan we raised for sileage and bales. We had a three point mounted cultivator on the 966. We actually called it "the sled" as it had metal tent guards on each row. You could really move with it but it sure took out lots of rows really fast if you weren't careful. I didn't used any herbicides until I started farming for myself. The only chemicals were anhydrous and things to spray the bins out with - some of those were pretty caustic. We were only wheat, milo, and barley for grains, so that kind of explains part of it. I farm many of the same crops I grew up with except for adding beans to the mix. Soybeans add so many chemical options and you really need to be strategic even if you use herbicides.

RandyB(MI) · Apr 20, 2015

Exactly what the others said and.... Our neighbor back in '63 was one of the first around MI to start what they called "minimum tillage" (plow -plant). had a 4010 with anhydrous tank and 4 btm plow with two clod busters behind it and left a very nice looking seed bed. Then came in with 3010 and 6 row planter and put in corn. After a few weeks the corn was up good and came in with attrazine to kill all the green blanket on the ground and by the time any new weeds started, the corn was shading ground. He covered a lot of acres and only his wife to jocky machinery to next field. He rented a lot of land for a few yrs there. If it was a dry year he suffered because the plowed ground would dry out down 8". On a wet year he did good. Had to give him credit for trying something new and I never saw any one farm as many acres as he did with a 4010 and a 3010. Back then seed was in bags and he manhandled every one himself out of the pick-up truck and into the planter. Don't remember what he did for fert. We did nothing but soybeans/wheat. Never used spray. Set cultivators right and hit the crop at the right time and roll dirt right up to/under the bean leaves. Winter wheat so no weed problems there either. Drilled it right in after soy harvest or navy beans which ever.

Tim(nj) · Apr 20, 2015

There were a few 4030 and 4230 factory narrow fronts out there too. Very rare though. Collectors might have jumped on all of them by now.

JMS/.MN · Apr 20, 2015

Drenched? Not only is your timing off regarding chemical use, so is your terminology. Cultivation doesn"t control insects, and crop rotation has little influence. BTW, we still rotate crops. People have been dying from cancer and simpler things since forever...years ago the simpler things killed them off before they got old enough to get cancer. BTW, do you want to go back to DDT from the 30s? About 1900, average American lived to be about 44 years old, when everything was "natural", now, over 70 yo.

farmerwithmutt · Apr 21, 2015

Don't forget check row for cross cultivated fields. Also cultivate on a good drying day suitable for making hay that way the roots dry out cultivate on a wet day and you transplant your weeds. There is also the fun of blind cultivating before the crop is up and you follow the planter marks and that long stick you carried to knock that clod of dirt off the corn plant Also rotary hoe .
As for chemicals I got accidentally over exposed to some bug killer and it almost got me since then I have to be careful what I'm around so I went sustainable and my yields were as good as anybody in the neighborhood and had less weeds then anybody and cost were lower

MN Scott · Apr 21, 2015

I think your going to start seeing more cultivators being used again. They are rear mount folding now up to 16 rows. My neighbor just bought a new 12 row cultivator to the tune of 40K! Several weeds have developed resistance to all the existing chemical families. I have water hemp that only one family of chemicals will touch and its not round up. Also there is giant ragweed in my area that nothing but steel will kill. Palmer Amaranth is also a super weed on the march north.

dhermesc · Apr 21, 2015

Or they died of cancer at 60 in their sleep after a long illness and doctor said they died of old age..... My grandmother died in her early 40s of what the family doctor called "a nervous condition" in the late 1920s. My aunts have probably properly diagnosed it as ovarian cancer (since several of them have had it and had similar symptons their mother had). Didn't matter - even if they knew it was cancer there wasn't a lot they could have done for her with 1920s cancer treatment.

dhermesc · Apr 21, 2015

Agreed. Watch the opening credits of the old show "Dallas", it shows an old 856 wide front with a mid mount cultivator......

My dad believed in mid mount cultivators even though they were a bear to put on every year. His opinion if the boys were to lazy to look down to make sure they were properly in the row they **** sure wouldn't look back to make sure the rear mount was properly in the row. Our 656s and 560s spent a lot of hours culivating.

BradyW · Apr 21, 2015

Spraying

Bill(Wis) · Apr 21, 2015

The 4030 & 4230 were the last Waterloos made with narrow front options but I don't know how many. I'm sure someone has those numbers.

What Happened to Row Crop Farming????

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