This Month’s Seasonal Beer – Straight Furrow 2.8% Low Strength – High Flavour

Local farmer Stuart Goodwin ploughing his field above Wincle.

February’s seasonal brew is Straight Furrow. Brewed in conjunction with Master Brewer Paul Buttrick, This 2.8% Mahogany Coloured beer is Brewed with shed loads of Amber Malt and triple hopped to ensure it is packed with flavour and body that belies it’s relativley low strength. Cheers

How to Use a Plough

Ploughs are used in farming for the initial preparation and cultivation of soil to make it ready for sowing seed or planting. The plough has a huge history and has been used in agriculture for thousands of years. Ploughs turn over the upper layer of soil which brings fresh nutrients to the surface. As well as bringing nutrients up it buries weeds and previous crop remains; by burying them they can then break down and add more nutrients back into the soil. Ploughing also aerates the soil so that it can hold in moisture more affectively. In more recent years ploughed fields are left to dry out and then harrowed before any planting takes place.

Plough History

Ploughs were originally pulled by oxen and later by horses. In countries that industrialised early their first means of fully ploughs mechanically was using steam. In more recent years the amount of ploughing being done has decreased due to lots of soil erosion. It is thought that shallower forms of ploughing and less invasive tillage techniques are better.

Modern Ploughs

Usually ploughs are multiple reversible ploughs which are mounted on a tractor. These newer ploughs have between two and seven mouldboards. You use the hydraulic system of the tractor to lift and reverse the plough as well as adjust the depth and furrow width. You have to set the draughting linkage from the tractor so that the plough travels along at the correct angle once in the soil. If you have a modern tractor then this can be controlled automatically. You can also attach ploughs to the front of tractors in addition to those on the rear.

Specialist Ploughs

• Chisel Plough – Common plough used for deep tillage with as little disruption to the soil as possible. This is used to aerate the soil while leaving crop residue on the surface. This plough will not invert or turn the soil; this is an attempt to minimise erosion. For these reasons the chisel plough is often seen as very sustainable.
• Ridging Plough – This type of plough is used for crops like potatoes which are grown on ridges of soil using the hilling technique. A ridging plough uses two mouldboards that face in opposite directions to cut deep furrows with high ridges on either side. The benefit of this plough is it can be used to split the ridges to harvest the crop.
• Mole Plough – This plough is sometimes called the subsoiler and allows drainage to be installed without trenches. It breaks up impermeable soil layers that stop drainage. This plough is very deep and leaves a deep channel underground.

Straight Furrow 2.8% Low strength - high flavour beer.

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