Guest guest Posted November 24, 2005 Report Share Posted November 24, 2005 I think you will find that the max a yoke of oxen can plow in a day is one acre. When Paul starkey visited the Manor last year he mentioned the main reason that small scale farmers went to tractors was for prestige. Tractors were subsidised in different ways to enable them to be bought but unless there was 200 acres (I think that is what he said) it was not economic to have a tractor. Interestingly we heard recently on this conference that the price of deisel in west Bengal is making the farmers look once again at working the oxen. I agree fully with Madhava Gosh (gourdmad) that in effect you have to have higher value crops to make ox farming realistically work unless it can be heavily subsidized in some way. An example: Wheat is selling at about £70 per tonne in this country. You can expect a yield per acre of about 2 tonnes. Just to plow the field (assuming you do it in eight hours) will cost a minimum salary of £40 (using UK minimum wage). Now the field has to be harrowed, the seeds sown, harrowed again, rolled and maybe harrowed again later for weeds. Once the grain has grown it has to be harvested. By hand it will take one person 40 hours (£200), by reaper (although I think the gearing is not suited for ox speed) would take a lot less but you would need lots of people to help. Once it is harvested it needs threshing and winnowing (vast amounts of time for an acres worth of grain). In a nutshell what I am showing is that you cannot grow wheat and market it in the same way as your tractor neighbours and expect to make a living. ys syam Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You are posting as a guest. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.