Kuzunalis
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FLTL Ch 280. The Seed Drill
🕑 Added 2025-07-24 14:30:02 +0000 UTCJoin up as the Duke of Tiranat to read 400 pages ahead.
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A/N: Enjoy the extra long chapter today!
Here is an illustration of what the seed drill might look like. Just imagine something like this, but with less iron and more wood.
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Kivamus nodded at Pinoto. "Yeah, but 110 hectares were needed just for the estimated village population of under 350 residents at that time, which was before we had started taking in immigrants or even those stonecutters. For the current population of Tiranat, which is over 400 already, we will need 130 to 140 hectares of farmland. I also plan to keep taking in more immigrants throughout the year, so we are certainly going to fall short of the amount of wheat we'll need to feed everyone by the time this crop is ready to harvest, but whatever we can grow here is grain that we don't have to spend gold on buying from Cinran."
Duvas nodded, "Still, we haven't stopped clearing the forest even now, and won't stop it until the sowing is complete. It's hard to be sure without measuring it, but I think there should be somewhere around 125 to 130 hectares of land cleared as of today. More by the time we complete the sowing."
"That's still only one part of what we need," Kivamus scratched the back of his head. "It doesn't matter how much cleared land we have if we don't have seeds to sow there. Ah well, let's see what can be done about that."
"Forgive me milord, but how much will that be in terms of acres?" Pinoto asked.
Kivamus did some mental calculations. "Above three hundred acres for sure."
Pinoto looked at the fields which were ready to sow. "Three hundred, huh?"
"If I was working a field this size in the previous farm where I worked in the past," the ex-farmer continued, "then even at a rough estimate we would need more than a hundred farmers just to sow the seeds. But you told me that just around two dozen men would be enough, even if they didn't have any experience in farming?"
Kivamus grinned. "Yup, although we'll still need the farmers for weeding, irrigating the plants and such things. This machine can't do any of that. It will be you and the other farmers who'll have to check how the plants are growing and put in more water or fertiliser... uh, manure as needed. That's why I told you to only bring experienced farmers to learn how to use this machine."
Pinoto nodded. "I'm just glad I already have a few dozen people here who have already done farming near Kirnos. It'd have been too difficult for me to manage everything by myself."
Kivamus nodded. "All those farmers are yours to use wherever needed." He looked at the farmers nearby who had finished hitching the new machine to a horse they'd brought with them. "Now let's give this seed drill a try. You and the other farmers helping here can learn everything about how it works today, so from tomorrow morning you should bring all the dozen seed drills here to start sowing at a larger scale."
Pinoto nodded, and called up one of the farmers. "Bring a sack of wheat and unload it into that... uh..." He glanced at Kivamus. "hopper, right?"
Kivamus nodded and pointed at the hopper. "Yup. Put the seeds in there."
The farmers immediately began doing as ordered, and before long, with the horse already hitched to the machine, they were ready to go.
"That's good," Kivamus said while pointing at a part of the machine. "Now pull that lever to allow the seeds to start dropping from the hopper, then start walking the horse forward."
The farmers did as ordered, and soon the seeding was underway. Looking carefully, it was easy to see that the level of stored seeds in the hopper had started to go down very slowly. The field had already been plowed recently, so the ground was soft enough for the four sharpened iron-made ground openers in the front of the machine to open four narrow furrows, into which four primitive wooden tubes going downwards from the hopper were putting down seeds in a periodic way, before a loose plank tied behind the machine with ropes was flattening the ground once again which covered the seeds.
Once the drill had moved a dozen meters or so away, Pinoto looked dubiously at Kivamus. "Is it really working?"
Kivamus grinned. "Why don't you check it?"
"I better..." Pinoto muttered as he walked towards the start of the field, and used a small trowel to dig at a place where the machine had already passed. He removed the soil from that newly dug hole and peered carefully into it for a while in the afternoon sunlight, while moving his hand around in it. Before long, he seemed to have found what he was looking for, and kept staring at his palm for a while. Eventually, he shook his head and moving a short distance away, he repeated the process and once again he paused to look into the ground for some time. He did it a few more times, before telling another farmer to flatten the ground once again, and walked back to Kivamus and the others.
Duvas was still staring at the drill being pulled by the horse which only needed a single farmer to keep an eye on it, although right now the other farmers had gathered around the machine in curiosity and were moving along with it at the same speed.
Pinoto looked at the seed drill which had moved further away by now, while shaking his head in awe. "This... this is insane! It is even sowing the seeds at the same distance again and again, which would be impossible if broadcasting the seeds by hand! If I still tried to do it by myself, it would have taken me half an hour to do what this machine has done in... in moments! Not to mention all the waste of seeds it is preventing! We usually have to weed out any plants if they have grown too close together, but it just won't happen anymore!"
Kivamus nodded with a grin, "That is just a small example of the kind of wonders which better technology can provide. So what do you think about it? You are the farmer here. The drill is working well enough but is it sowing the seeds properly?"
Pinoto glanced back at the ground where he had just checked it. "The depth at which the machine is putting seeds in, is decent enough. Although I think the seeds are being put a little too far apart. This is the first time any farming is being done on this land, so we can grow more plants per acre here then we could have on a regularly sown field. I just wish we could have tested this earlier, since you don't have time to make new machines to change it now."
Kivamus grinned. "We don't need to build it again at all. I'll show you all the parts and levers when the farmers come back with the drill, but a machine doesn't mean something which is forever fixed in its working. I designed it in a way so we can modify whatever we need to. If you want, you can easily change the depth at which the drill is putting seeds in, for example when you are sowing something other than wheat, and you can just as easily change the distance between the seeds by just moving another lever a little bit."
"You don't have to build a new machine for that?" Pinoto asked in awe. "That's... I didn't expect that! If it can really do that, then I want to change it to sow the seeds a little deeper too."
"Of course, once those farmers return I will tell you how to do everything yourself."
One of the villagers who had helped in loading the seeds into the hopper and had been listening from nearby, hesitantly walked closer. ?Milord, this... this drill wouldn't attack us or something, right?"
Kivamus was way too surprised after hearing it to give a proper reply. "Uh, what...?"
The labourer looked uneasily at the machine which was now coming closer to them, while sowing seeds in four rows parallel to the first four ones which were already sown. "I mean... that is a big... machine and it looks powerful. It also has sharp iron points and such. What if it suddenly decided that it didn't want to be tamed anymore and turned on us? And attacked us like an adzee? None of us would survive then!"
Duvas was now frowning at the drill, while Pinoto took a step away from the machine, which had been stopped nearby by the farmers.
"Now that I think about it..." Pinoto muttered, "I am not sure either if these machines are safe enough..."
It was only now that Kivamus understood that for these medieval people who had never seen any real machines in their lives or even heard about it, some weird new contraption which could easily do the work of a man might seem like something which also had a mind and a life of its own. Of course, living in the 21st century on earth, he had heard more than enough stories and seen enough movies of machines turning on humans and taking over the world or something, but he hadn't expected to see a similar reaction here, even though it made sense from the labourers' perspective.
Not wanting to laugh at them, since their ignorance was not their fault in any way, he took a moment to compose himself before explaining, "There is nothing like that. This seed drill - or any other machine which is built in Tiranat - is not dangerous by itself. Just like a knife or a sword can't kill a bandit by themselves. So this seed drill will do exactly what you make it do, and nothing more." He shrugged. "Of course, just like falling on your own knife would kill you just as easily as a bandit stabbing you with it, so you do have to make sure you don't stand in the path of this seed drill when it is being pulled by a horse to prevent any injuries."
Pinoto and the other labourers listened carefully as he continued, "Even so, this machine does not hold a mind of its own, and it simply cannot even move a single step without a horse pulling it. You saw how we had to carry it on a wagon earlier, right? It didn't walk here on its own."
Once others nodded, he added, "You all know the carpenter Darora, don't you? He and his apprentices built this seed drill by their own hands with the help of the parts which the blacksmith Cedoron provided. If we remove the nails holding this machine together, it will become nothing more than a bunch of wooden sticks and some iron. That is all it is. So don't worry, it is never going to attack you."
The labourers looked doubtfully at the machine before they nodded, while some of them started whispering to each other, but now with smiles on their faces.
Pinoto stared at the seed drill for a moment. "I believe you, milord. As little as it makes sense for something like this to be created by human hands, I don't think anything built by you can ever harm the villagers."
The other men and women listening from nearby nodded at that, while some of them spoke openly in support.
"Yes! Lord Kivamus made it. It'll never hurt us!"
"That's true!"
Kivamus smiled at them, pleased that they didn't think the machine was a demon from the hell coming to kill them anymore. He looked at Pinoto and the other farmers. "Well, let me show you all how to adjust the drill to make it sow the seeds at different distances and depths. Other farmers are plowing the fields right now, but you all can explain it to them tomorrow so we can start sowing at full scale."
With that he walked towards the seed drill to describe its primitive but effective controls to the farmers. It was time to show them the marvels of technology.
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Next chapter: FLTL Ch 281. A Dangerous Region
Comments
Gabriel Melnik
I wouldn't call primitive to one of the precursors of the Combine Harvester. Primitive would be a hunter gatherer society where farming isn't a concept in my opinion. Also the concerns the farmer had about the drill are valid, even if the way he expressed his fears are stupid, farming machinery is dangerous.
mxdanger
I will admit, as soon as I opened up the table of contents I was shell shocked to see the chapter name and how many chapters it took to get from initial idea to execution.
Kuzunalis
Good idea! Added a sentence to reflect that.
Kenneth Welever
Emphasize that it can hurt them just like any moron tripping between a moving horse and a plow can be hurt.
