Loading...
The Rural Voice, 1990-05, Page 52can -con YYItEm.1 #1 RATED HOG FEEDER— For the least amount of feed wastage Single or double, nursery or fat hog feeders —14 gauge steel, or plastic with stainless steel * Hog Equipment Farrowing Crates, Dry Sow Stalls, Penning, Hog Scales, Feed Carts, Flooring * Cattle Equipment Rubber Cow Mats, Self Locking Headgates, Free Stalls & Comfort Stalls, Fans, Waterbowls, Gates, Hay Feeders • Partial listing: come in & see our comprehensive selection of livestock equipment and health products A division of Steve's Welding R. R. 1, Newton, Ont. NOK 1R0 519-595-8737 M -RD -820 Ring drive without an extra motor RING DRIVE: With the roller -chain ring drive, only one motor powers the machine. AUTOMATIC LOWERING OPTION: A winch lowers the RD -820 automatically after each complete revolution. GATHERING CHAIN: The Patz cutters and claws cut loose frozen and hard packed silage efficiently, and then move it to the blower faster. POWER CUTTER: Spring tension keeps high- speed, self -sharpening blades tight to the silo wall to shave it clean. TOROUE LIMITER: Ratchet -pin design protects the ring and drive system while v'orking through tough conditions. Ask about Patz dual -auger unloaders. Progressive Farming R.R.2, Wellesley 519-656-2709 Rannoch 519-229-6700 RIM 48 THE RURAL VOICE Voice from the Pa It's often been said: "The more thing's change, the more they stay the same." But farm life has certainly undergone dramatic and irreversible changes. Writer Wayne Kelly provides evidence for both views: one, the changes in farming and rural life have been so thorough that the past seems quaint; two, "modern" problems really aren' t so modern after all. Either way, the"voices from the past" haven't lost their relevance. AND HOME MAGAZINE_ FO(NDED ,em. The importance of caring for "little changes" on the farm was often the subject of weekly editorials in The Farmer's Advocate and Home Magazine, published in London from 1866 until 1948. These pithy commentaries helped our grandfathers and great-grandfathers whip this part of the world into one of the most productive agricultural areas on earth. (from The Farmer's Advocate, October 5, 1911) THE IMPORTANCE OF DETAIL The success or failure of any business enterprise depends largely upon the attention given to detail. What other calling would stand as little attention as is given by the average agriculturalist to his work? It is a fact that farmers are very much prone to let the small things slip, with- out much care, and it is also true that these seemingly trifling branches of his occupation are in reality the very foundation of it. A small leak will sink a great ship. Slipshod methods are never profitable, and tend to make the proprietor heartily sick of his work, and to also give the public a bad impression of him and his calling. The profits are not always made from the larger undertakings in connection with agriculture, but more often from the smaller branches which are allowed to go untouched by the great mass engaged in crop production. The general level of everything in connection with the agricultural calling can only be raised by placing more importance on the "little things." Dr. G. C. Creelman, president of the Ontario Agricultural College, recently stated, in an address delivered in Toronto, that if seeds were hand-picked, and only large, plump seeds returned to the soil, a 20 per cent crop increase would result. Yet this is considered by many as a "little thing," and seed selection is not practised on anything like the scale it should be. This is only one of the many important phases of the business that do not receive the attention that they merit. The scarcity of farm labour makes it more difficult to give every part of the work due recognition, but there are many who, even if they had abundance of labour at their disposal, would overlook the details and exert all their energies upon the larger phases of their occupation. Let the detail connected with the farm work be done as carefully as that of the main branches of the business, and see if the results do not warrant the most careful application to the "little things."0