Cultural Practices: Pre-planting and Tillage

PRE-PLANTING OPERATION

• Land Preparation
• Stumping
• Farm lay-out
• Tillage
• Ridging

Cultural Practices: Cultural practices are the various ways of ensuring the good growth and establishment of crops. Cultural practices are classified into pre-planting, planting, post-planting, harvesting and storage operations

PRE-PLANTING OPERATIONS

These are the operations carried out before planting, while planting is the sowing of seeds. Post-planting operation include thinning, supplying, irrigation, manuring, mulching and weeding.

(a)        Land Preparation: It is carried out by cutting the vegetation and grasses with cutlass  or hoes and felling of trees with axes. It can also be done mechanically.

            Burning of thrash (grasses) cut down is not a good habit since it destroys the organic matter content of the soil including soil microbes.

(b)        Stumping: This is the removal of stumps by digging them out manually using cutlasses and axes. It can also be done mechanically by using bulldozer. Stumps are the left over of already cut trees on the farm on the soil surface.

(c)        Farm layout: Farm layout is a judicious way of using the farmland where the plots are divided into sections and each section is used to give maximum yield.

(d)        Tillage: This is the breaking or turning of the soil with a simple tool or farm machine after the land has been cleared in preparation for planting crops, it can be done manually with a hoe or mechanically with a Tractor – driven – disc- plough.

Ploughing is cutting through the soil and making it into lumps or clods of soil called primary tillage. While secondary tillage (harrowing) is the use of harrow to break down the large clods of soil into fine particles and making it ready for ridging.

EVALUATION

1. What is a cultural practice?
2. Mention and explain three pre-planting operation

IMPORTANCE OF TILLAGE

1. It loses the soil and allows air and water to reach the roots of plants.
2. It allows easy penetration of roots into the soil.
3. Plant nutrients are brought to the reach of the plant root.
4. Tillage helps to destroy pest by exposing them to the sun.
5. It ensures proper mixture of manure and fertilizer with the soil.

Ridging: This involves the making of ridges on the farm, sometimes heaps are also made to serve the purpose of ridges on slopes.Ridges are made across, with  the ridges made at intervals to check erosion.Ridges also help to provide water for plant use and aid root penetration and establishment of crops.

GENERAL EVALUATION

• What is land clearing?
• What is stumping
• Define tillage and state three importance of tillage
• What is ridging?

READING ASSIGNMENT

Junior Secondary agriculture for Nigerian schools Bk 2 by A. Youdeowei, B.K. Kaigama, J.N Ogbazi, S.O. Adesiyan. Chapter 9 pages 37 – 40

WEEKEND ASSIGNMENT

1.         Primary tillage is otherwise known as ______(a) harrowing (b) ploughing (c) ridging  (d) stumping

2.         Secondary tillage is otherwise known as _____(a)harrowing (b) ploughing (c)        ridging (d) stumping

3.         In farm layout, plots undergo _______ (a)    division (b) multiplication (c) digging  (d) covering

4.         The operation that follows tillage is   (a)        ridging (b) stumping (c) clearing (d) layout

5.         Stumping is carried out with the following except ________(a)gun  (b) cutlass (c) bulldozer  (d) axe

THEORY

1. What is cultural practice?
2. Define the following terms:    (a)  land clearing  (b)  ridging