Farmers! – How To Maximize The Use Of The Rotavator; Compare Your “Cut-Throw Cultivation” Versus FAH’s “Cut-Root Cultivation”!

An Agriculturist (UP Los Baños, 1965), son of a farmer, I have a love affair of 6 decades with the rotavator! In my hometown Asingan, Pangasinan, it was love at first sight when I saw my first big Howard tractor rotavator – man falling for a machine, can you imagine that?!

Let me continue the story by quoting myself from my article “IRRI, PhilRice, The Rotavator & Lorenzo’s Secret” (27 April 2020, THiNK Journalism, blogspot.com):

“That 1965, I was instructing the driver of the big tractor not to set the blades to any depth but just drive through the field, and because the Howard rotavator was heavy, it cut into the soil anyway, about 2-3 inches, which is what I wanted. My brother-in-law Lorenzo Casasus, was there at that time; in later years he copied the shallow cultivation with his Kuliglig hand tractor and rototiller. The results? His neighbors could not match his yields even if they tried to copy all his methods – he did not tell them about the magic that his rototiller was doing.

Googling again just now, I see that the essence of “Lorenzo’s Secret” has never been discovered by farmers, not by researchers, and not even rotavator manufacturers. As I have termed them just now, “cut-root cultivation” is Lorenzo’s Secret; “cut-throw cultivation” is the one that the manufacturers are endorsing to farmers and gardeners. To compare:

In cut-root culvation, you cut the field down only to the roots of the weeds and crop refuse (if any). This way, you mix soil and plant together to make a field mulch – free organic fertilizer already evenly laid down all over your farm!
(image from diytroop.com)

In cut-throw cultivation, you cut deep into the soil to overturn the whole field, then harrow out the pieces of plants, throw them into a pile, then burn. This way, you burn the organic matter that should instead be applied your farm!

Does the world know Lorenzo’s Secret?

After 5:35 PM of Wednesday, 11 Sept 2024, I googled for “rotavator” and Google Chrome gives me “127,000 search results.” Here I am reading “How To Use The Rotavator (DIY Troop, diytroop.com). Matt has written his lengthy “How-To Guides, Tips and Tricks How-To Guides, Tips and Tricks.” Here he says:

“Rotavators … use their rotating blades to stir and pulverize the soil and aerate it, getting it reading for planting seeds or flower bulbs. Breaking up the soil also improves its drainage. That’s the main function of a cultivator.”

[Aside: Matt (no family name given) is an expert with rotavators; I am an expert in editing – “getting it reading” should read “getting it ready”!]

Matt says, “Breaking up the soil also improves its drainage. That’s the main function of a cultivator.”

I say, “No! Not breaking up the soil; the main function of a rotavator is to enrich the soil. How? By cutting the weeds and the soil into pieces and mixing them simultaneously in the same rotary motion. Enriching your soil naturally – that’s Lorenzo’s Secret.”@517