AGRICULTURE AND IRRIGATION

AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENTS

The field tools and implements are largely of old and indigenous types and improved contrivances have hardly made any progress in the district. The implements in active use in the district can be broadly classified as:-

(1) Soil preparation implements:—

(i) Plough (nangar).

(ii) Clod-crusher (maind or alwat or gutephali).

 (iii) Peg tooth harrow (datal).

(iv) Leveller (petari).

(2) Hand tools:−

(i) Narrow spade (khanti).

(ii) Flat spade (phavada).

(iii) Pick-axe (tikav).

(iv) Axe (kurhad).

(v) Rake (ale or mangere).

(vi) Fork (baila or suli).

(vii) Water splasher (shimpi).

(viii) Wood-cutting big knife (pal or pankatre or koyta).

(ix) Sickle (vila).

(x) Weeding hook (khurpi).

(xi) Crow-bar (pahar).

As no drills are used for the purpose of sowing paddy, no inter-culturing implements are generally used in the district. With the implementation of the Japanese method of paddy cultivation, however, the hoe is found to be useful in removing weeds, loosening the soil, conserving the moisture and in aerating the soil in some parts of the district, till such time as the crop attains a height of twelve to fifteen inches. Similarly, except the sickle (vila), the scoop (soop), the basket, wooden or iron, and similar other hand-tools, there are no special harvesting, threshing and winnowing implements in use in the district.

Plough.

Of all the implements, the plough is perhaps the most important. It is constructed typically with the body and the handle manufactured in two separate pieces. The beam is mortised into the body. The end of the share working in the soil is held in position with the shoe by a round or oval iron ring and the other end is held in position by insertion of a wooden peg into the scoothed end of the share. The other end of the peg is mortised into the angular position between the body and the shoe. In some cases, the device of a peg fastener is substituted by allowing the other end of the share to be hooked rectangularly and hammered on the shoe. The body and the shoe form one integral unit. The entire implement is made of sag, bhendi, ain, khair, chinch, shivan, kinjal, fanas and similar other species of wood available in the district. It has a furrow from two to four inches deep and from four to five inches wide. It is remarkably light, its weight varying from 25 to 40 lbs. only, due to the fact that it is made of light wood and of smaller sections. Its lightness makes it perhaps the best designed implement for bullocks of a low pulling capacity. As the plough is worked under relatively wet conditions of land, it lasts for three to four years.

Clod-crusher.

The clod-crusher is a wooden plank from six to eight feet long and 9"x 2" in section. It is made of the same material as the plough. A beam is fixed either in the centre of the plank or a bifurcated beam is used and hitched on the yoke. Like the earlier implement, it is light, its weight varying from 25 to 35 lbs. and lasts for four to six years. But not infrequently are the farmers found to use wooden hammers to break clods and the clod-crusher in the puddling operation.

Tooth Harrow.

Peg tooth harrow is an implement used for levelling the land and collecting weeds after puddling throughout the district and, in some parts of it, after the sowing operation in order to have more or less, uniform sowing, when paddy is broadcast. As it has been provided with pegs, it removes the bunches of crowded and sprouted seeds. It consists of a wooden headpiece about six feet in length and 6" x 3" in section. The wooden pegs each with a length varying from four to five inches and a diameter of about an inch are fixed on to one side of the headpiece so as to leave space of two or three inches between any two pegs. The bifurcated ends of the beam are fixed into the headpiece. The implement has the same lightness as the plough and the clod-crusher, as it weighs from 30 to 40 lbs., but lasts much longer than these, from ten to fifteen years, if used carefully.

Leveller.

Leveller (petari) is used for levelling the field. The soil is collected by holding its frame vertical and it may fall out as soon as the latter is fitted down after the desired place is reached. The implement consists of a wooden frame which is fitted with bamboo strips. The top of the frame carries a handle. On the lower and outer sides of the frame, the bifurcated ends of the beam are loosely fitted with pegs. The implement is used only by a few farmers in the district.

Hand Tools.

Besides the soil preparation implements worked with the help of bullocks and a driver, there are a few other tools which are used in the various agricultural operations and worked by hand. Of these, the rake (ale), the fork (baila) and the water splasher (shimpi) are in common use. The rake is used for collecting dry leaves and grass for rab and threshed material on the yard. In garden lands, it is used for even distribution of sown seeds. It is from eighteen to twenty-four inches long with a section headpiece of 3" x 2", in which wooden teeth are fixed. Each tooth is five or six feet long and one and a half or two inches in diameter. Iron nails are sometimes fixed in place of wooden teeth. The fork is used for lifting and carrying a bundle of thorny branches collected for fencing. The tapered end is pierced into the bundle. The pole is held vertical in the hand close to the shoulder and the inter-woven portion of the fork rests on the head., The implement consists of a wooden pole from six to eight feet long with a diameter of two or three inches and tapered at the top. A forked branch is secured, about three and half feet from the top, to the pole in-between two horizontal pegs mortised into the pole. The space within the arms of the fork is interwoven with coir strings. The water splasher is a kind of wood hopper with a concave cavity in the centre of about six inches circular curvature and used for watering the seed-beds by splashing water from nearby water channels.

The narrow spade and the flat spade are useful in repairing and making bunds and water channels and in filling the fields with soil and manures. The pick-axe is used for digging out and harvesting various root crops. The wood-cutting big knife and the axe are important implements meant for cutting and chopping trees and wood. The sickle and the weeding hook are so common in use that every working member of the cultivator's family owns a set of these tools. The crow-bar, either wooden or iron-toothed, is usually worked for collecting and removing waste materials from the fields, lifting clods or stones, digging holes and other allied operations. Threshing is usually done by bullocks unaided by appliances. For winnowing, the bamboo scoop (soop) is used. The worker takes a position on a higher plain and gradually drops the grains from the scoop and the husk blows away. The sieve (chalan) is used for separating the grain from dust, sand and pebbles or from big straw pieces.

Water Lifts.

In the coastal strip of the district, many wells are dug with plenty of sub-soil fresh water. These wells are used for irrigating garden crops. The persian wheel (rahat) is a common device for lifting water from the wells. The mol is not a common use in the district due to low animal power. Another water-lifting device is the okti, whereby a vertical pole is fixed on the top of the well and a horizontal pole hinged at the height of about ten feet at the bifurcated end of the vertical pole. The horizontal pole is from twenty to thirty feet long, counterbalanced by tying heavy stones at one end and the bucket at the other, through the rope or the pole. The man stands on the edge of the well, lowers down the bucket and works it by emptying it in the water channel. The device can be operated especially in shallow wells having from ten to fifteen feet water level from the ground.

Thus, of all the implements, those utilised for the preparation of the soil are the most important. Some renovations are also taking place in the province of agricultural implements. Wooden ploughs' are being replaced by iron ones, although the rate of replacement is very slow. Pumps worked by electric motors and oil-engines are also coming into use in some parts of the district. An account of agricultural implements given above should be adequate, as they represent implements of special importance. Besides these, there may be a number of other less important implements. The following table gives the number of agricultural implements in use in the district, in 1956:―

TABLE No. 75

 NUMBER OF AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENTS

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