These are understood to be the tools in common use in England and Scotland, for sod-draining, and for any other drains, indeed, except tiles. The widest is 12 inches wide, and is used to remove the first spit, of about one foot depth. The second is 12 inches wide at top, and 8 at the point, and the third, eight at top, and four at the point. The narrowest spade is usually made with a spur in front, or what the Irish call a treader, on which to place the foot in driving it into the earth.
Fig. 64.
Spade with Spur.
Figs. 65, 66.—Common Shovel and Spade.
For wedge drains, these spades are made narrower than those above represented, the finishing spade being but two and a half inches wide at the point. It will be recollected that this kind of drainage is only adapted to clay land. The shovels and spades which have been heretofore in most common use in New England are made with short handles, thus—
They are of cast-steel, and combine great strength and lightness. Long-handled shovels and spades are much preferred, usually, by Irish laborers, whose fancy is worth consulting in matters with which they have so much to do. We believe their notion is correct, that the long-handled tool is the easier to work with, at almost any job.
In our own draining, we find the common spade, with long or short handle, to be best in marking out the lines in turf; and either the spade or common shovel, according to the nature of the soil, most convenient in removing the first foot of earth.
After this, if the pick is used, a long-handled round-pointed shovel, now in common use on our farms, is found convenient, until the ditch is too narrow for its use. Then the same shovel, turned up at the sides so as to form a narrow scoop, will be found better than any tool we yet have to remove this loosened earth.