Chapter 3. Tillage

ABSTRACT [First paragraph]: Gill and Vanden Berg (1968) defined tillage as a process aimed at creating a desired final soil condition from some initial soil condi-tion through manipulation of soil. For thousands of years humans have been tilling soil using some sort of mechanical devices to create that desired soil condition to in-crease crop production (McKyes, 1985). About 3000 years ago inhabitants of the Eu-phrates and Nile valleys used simple wedge-shaped plows for tilling soil. Iron plows were used in China more than 2000 years ago. In early 1700 A. D. plows similar to the ones used today appeared in parts of Europe. The first tempered cast iron plow was patented in 1785 (by Robert Ransome of Norwich, England). John Deere devel-oped a steel plow with a share and a moldboard in the 1830s. Although some changes in the geometric shape have taken place since the 1930s, the moldboard plow has re-mained virtually unchanged since that time..