Mary Fisher writes

"Oz" wrote in message
...
Mary Fisher writes

I'd like to know more about flint sickles.

It was a travellers journal I once read that stuck in my memory.
Apparently the locals preferred their flint sickles because:

1) They were much cheaper than steel ones.
2) They were lighter and easier to use.
3) They only needed 'sharpening' once every few days.
4) They cut better.

The date was about 1902.

If all the above is right why aren't they still used?

I don't know, it was unstated. However maybe the crofters were in fact
very poor and this was a good enough excuse or that the ability to
quickly knap perfect flint flakes was lost in following generations.

And how did they get a piece of flint big enough?

The flint sickles I have seen have been a wooden frame with the flakes
set in it. I can believe this would work quite well, remember modern
combine sections for cereals are serrated - plain ones do not work very
well.

The only result of your reply is to make me even more curious!

Unfortunately I have no more information. I remembered it because the
reasons seemed plausible. Certainly I have seen skilled people use flint
tools to butcher a carcass and the cutting ability and retention of edge
of flint is quite extraordinary. Not crude tools at all.

--
Oz
This post is worth absolutely nothing and is probably fallacious.
Note: soon (maybe already) only posts via despammed.com will be accepted.

Gordon Couger writes

Freshly knapped flint of the right kind would be sharper than any steel
blade could ever be and hold its edge a great deal longer. I have found
arrow heads that were still pretty sharp after being in the ground hundreds
of years.

Swap you a flint arrowhead for a low denomination roman coin (rather
corroded due alkaline soil), or a musketball?

--
Oz
This post is worth absolutely nothing and is probably fallacious.
Note: soon (maybe already) only posts via despammed.com will be accepted.

Oz wrote in message
...
Mary Fisher writes

Unfortunately I have no more information. I remembered it because the
reasons seemed plausible. Certainly I have seen skilled people use
flint
tools to butcher a carcass and the cutting ability and retention of
edge
of flint is quite extraordinary. Not crude tools at all.


certainly better than steel for cutting open big bales. Goes through
silage wrap a treat.


--
Jim Webster

"The pasture of stupidity is unwholesome to mankind"

'Abd-ar-Rahman b. Muhammad b. Khaldun al-Hadrami'

--
Oz
This post is worth absolutely nothing and is probably fallacious.
Note: soon (maybe already) only posts via despammed.com will be
accepted.

"Jim Webster" wrote in message
...




certainly better than steel for cutting open big bales. Goes through
silage wrap a treat.

Thanks, Jim, that's going to be useful to know hereabouts ...

Mary

Xref: 127.0.0.1 sci.agricultu61948 uk.business.agricultu107818


"Gordon Couger" wrote in message
news:3e3e3d41_1@newsfeed...



There is a fellow in the US that makes obsidian knives for eye surgeons
using the same flaking methods as were used for flint knives. Laboratories
also use freshly broken glass knives to section specimens for examination
for microscopes. So the art is not completely lost.

There are still people flint knapping but I've never seen any piece of flint
big enough to compare with even a small sickle blade. I wondered if they
grew bigger in Oz's 30C (or whenever it was ... )

Mary

"Jim Webster" wrote in message
...

Gilgamesh wrote in message
...
Yes, I know the sickle is still in use - although we had progressed
to
steel, I used one 2 or 3 times in the 1950's & 60's to open up the
cornfields for the self-binder - and Orwell notes the use of the
sickle in
North Africa between the wars (as well as plough teams of an ox & an
ass)
--

here in the NW of England the biggest use of the sickle in the 20th
century was actually cutting the grass etc on a dike cop (the bank a
hedge is grown on) as you were trimming the dike.
In this area In the 20th century, a ley or scythe was used for opening
out, not a sickle.


--
Jim Webster

"The pasture of stupidity is unwholesome to mankind"

'Abd-ar-Rahman b. Muhammad b. Khaldun al-Hadrami'


I don't dispute that, although I was taught that the bagging hook was the
tool for the job. I'm sure either did at least as good a job as the big
petrol strimmer my cousin uses on the hedgebanks now - and we could use the
resulting hay for the rabbits. I would, however, have been 10/11/12 at the
time, not
big enough to handle a scythe, and not savvy enough to be trusted with one
anyway. I usually got roped in on the basis that David (my friend & the
farmer's son) couldn't come fishing until the job was done, so it was a
sickle each. These were smallish fields of oats - D's dad still used the
self-binder on those, although he combined the rest of the grain crops (he
fed the oats in the sheaf if my memory isn't playing tricks)

--
May glorious Shamash make his face to shine upon you

Gilgamesh of Uruk
(Include Enkidu in the subject line to avoid the spam trap)

Mary Fisher wrote in message
t...

"Jim Webster" wrote in message
...




certainly better than steel for cutting open big bales. Goes through
silage wrap a treat.

Thanks, Jim, that's going to be useful to know hereabouts ...

depends whether you are at daughters or in Leeds I suppose :-))


--
Jim Webster

"The pasture of stupidity is unwholesome to mankind"

'Abd-ar-Rahman b. Muhammad b. Khaldun al-Hadrami'



Mary

Xref: 127.0.0.1 sci.agricultu61951 uk.business.agricultu107847


"Oz" wrote in message .

Swap you a flint arrowhead for a low denomination roman coin (rather
corroded due alkaline soil), or a musketball?

My brother got off with them all. I will look around and see if I can come
up with one.

Gordon

Gilgamesh wrote in message
...
I would, however, have been 10/11/12 at the
time, not
big enough to handle a scythe, and not savvy enough to be trusted with
one
anyway. I usually got roped in on the basis that David (my friend &
the
farmer's son) couldn't come fishing until the job was done, so it was
a
sickle each. These were smallish fields of oats - D's dad still used
the
self-binder on those, although he combined the rest of the grain crops
(he
fed the oats in the sheaf if my memory isn't playing tricks)


Was it fed to sheep? or do any of our nutritionalists know if oats can
be fed to cattle un-rolled and still digested.

--
Jim Webster

"The pasture of stupidity is unwholesome to mankind"

'Abd-ar-Rahman b. Muhammad b. Khaldun al-Hadrami'

Jim Webster writes

Was it fed to sheep? or do any of our nutritionalists know if oats can
be fed to cattle un-rolled and still digested.

Barley certainly can be (and is), so I guess oats would be fine too.
Wheat is not so good as I understand it because the gluten makes it too
sticky, and stock don;t like it so much.

--
Oz
This post is worth absolutely nothing and is probably fallacious.
Note: soon (maybe already) only posts via despammed.com will be accepted.

In article 3e3f4c42_4@newsfeed, Gordon Couger
writes

"Oz" wrote in message .

Swap you a flint arrowhead for a low denomination roman coin (rather
corroded due alkaline soil), or a musketball?

My brother got off with them all. I will look around and see if I can come
up with one.

A visiting American (from Idaho) gave me one:-)

Grey in colour and shaped like the apostle on a spoon. Not particularly
finely made but nicer as a gift than followed by 3' of wood and Turkey
feathers.

regards

--
Tim Lamb

Gilgamesh wrote in message
...
If my memory serves, it was fed to the bullocks he fattened. He cut it
still
slightly green which I understand raises the protein - and may mean
that
the corn is still in the milk. I don't know if that makes it more or
less
digestible.

makes it sound like 'whole crop' which would be


--
Jim Webster

"The pasture of stupidity is unwholesome to mankind"

'Abd-ar-Rahman b. Muhammad b. Khaldun al-Hadrami'


--
May glorious Shamash make his face to shine upon you

Gilgamesh of Uruk
(Include Enkidu in the subject line to avoid the spam trap)
"Oz" wrote in message
...
Jim Webster writes

Was it fed to sheep? or do any of our nutritionalists know if oats
can
be fed to cattle un-rolled and still digested.

Barley certainly can be (and is), so I guess oats would be fine too.
Wheat is not so good as I understand it because the gluten makes it
too
sticky, and stock don;t like it so much.

--
Oz
This post is worth absolutely nothing and is probably fallacious.
Note: soon (maybe already) only posts via despammed.com will be
accepted.

If my memory serves, it was fed to the bullocks he fattened. He cut it still
slightly green which I understand raises the protein - and may mean that
the corn is still in the milk. I don't know if that makes it more or less
digestible.

--
May glorious Shamash make his face to shine upon you

Gilgamesh of Uruk
(Include Enkidu in the subject line to avoid the spam trap)
"Oz" wrote in message
...
Jim Webster writes

Was it fed to sheep? or do any of our nutritionalists know if oats can
be fed to cattle un-rolled and still digested.

Barley certainly can be (and is), so I guess oats would be fine too.
Wheat is not so good as I understand it because the gluten makes it too
sticky, and stock don;t like it so much.

--
Oz
This post is worth absolutely nothing and is probably fallacious.
Note: soon (maybe already) only posts via despammed.com will be accepted.

"Oz" wrote in message
...
Jim Webster writes

Was it fed to sheep? or do any of our nutritionalists know if oats can
be fed to cattle un-rolled and still digested.

Barley certainly can be (and is), so I guess oats would be fine too.
Wheat is not so good as I understand it because the gluten makes it too
sticky, and stock don;t like it so much.

I suspect that you might have miss read the question - I am unaware of any
cereal grains that can be fed to cattle whole successfully. Barley passes
straight through judging by the evidence I have seen from when they have
found the grains in straw and eaten them whole.

Dan

--
Oz
This post is worth absolutely nothing and is probably fallacious.
Note: soon (maybe already) only posts via despammed.com will be accepted.

"Dan" wrote in message
...

"Oz" wrote in message
...
Jim Webster writes

Was it fed to sheep? or do any of our nutritionalists know if oats can
be fed to cattle un-rolled and still digested.

Barley certainly can be (and is), so I guess oats would be fine too.
Wheat is not so good as I understand it because the gluten makes it too
sticky, and stock don;t like it so much.

I suspect that you might have miss read the question - I am unaware of any
cereal grains that can be fed to cattle whole successfully. Barley passes
straight through judging by the evidence I have seen from when they have
found the grains in straw and eaten them whole.

Oats can be fed to calves with out much going though them while they are
still on their mothers.
Rolling will pay for doing it.

In the 1800's and the first part of the 1900's the feedlot used to run a mix
of hogs and cattle to utilize the undigested feed. The feed troughs were too
high for the hogs to get at and the cattle were fed whole grain. The feedlot
operator owned the hogs and fed the cattle for some one else. They fed whole
corn and barley.

In the 60's feed lots in the US started processing grain with steam before
rolling it make something very much like corn flake breakfast cereal. It
increased the digestibility of the grain enough over conventionally ground
grain that it was more economical to put cattle in the commercial lots than
feed them ourselves with paid for lots, grinding and mixing machinery. The
smell of feed lot changed when they went to steam flaking as well.

Gordon