\bookfoldsheets0TEXT1. IMPORTANCE OF MACHINERY AND ENERGY IN AGRICULTURE

1. Read and translate the text. Use the wordlist below.

More and more machines are used on farms today. Machines that are used for crop production till the soil, plant the crops, perform various cultural practices and harvest the crops.

Many machines are known to be powered by tractors. Implements such as plows, cultivators and planters may be mounted on a tractor or they may be pulled by a tractor.

Grain combine harvesters, cotton pickers, forage harvesters, and many other specialized farm machines are now self-propelled.

Some machines do not require mobility and are usually powered with electric motors. They are silage unloader, livestock feeding equipment and milking machines.

Modern farm machines are different from those the farmers used two or even one decade ago. The tractors, tractor-drawn planters and drills were smaller and less productive.

Wordlist

power, to power – энергия, приводить в движение

to till the soil – обрабатывать почву

implement – орудие

plow (AmE)/ plough (BrE) – плуг

cultivator – культиватор

planter – посадочная машина, сажалка

to mount – навешивать, устанавливать

to pull – тянуть, тащить

self-propelled – самоходный

combine harvester – уборочный комбайн

cotton picker – хлопкоуборочная машина

silage unloader – разгрузочная машина для силоса

equipment – оборудование

milking machine – доильный аппарат

2. Answer the following questions.

1) What machines are mounted on a tractor?

2) What self-propelled machines do you know?

3) Are milking machines powered with electricity?

3. Choose ten words or word combinations from the text and learn them by heart.

4. Make a summary of Text 1 (Or learn the underlined sentences by heart). Text 2. Various types of farm machines

1. Read and translate the text. Use the wordlist below.

There are various types of machines that plow the soil, plant the seeds, cultivate the plants, harvest the crops and transport the products harvested. They are lorries, different drills, planters and harvesters. At present nearly every branch of agronomy uses specialized harvesters. They are grain combine harvesters, corn pickers, cotton pickers, tea pickers, fruit pickers and tomato harvesters. For harvesting root and tuber crops there exist various diggers such as potato diggers, carrot diggers, sugar beet diggers, onion diggers, etc.

Before 1930 most corn was picked by hand, one ear at a time. Today self-propelled pickers are used on many farms.

First steel plows came to the fields in 1940s. First plows were of the ‘walking’ type. The operator walked behind the plow while horses pulled it. Some decades later the first riding plow was developed. The plow was mounted on wheels and pulled by two to four horses. It had a place for the operator to sit. The operator could plow two acres per day, as compared to about one acre with the walking plow. Today there are tractor-drawn plows.

Broadcasting by hand was used in different countries as the main method of planting wheat and other small grains about a century ago. Later various types of grain drills and seeders have been developed. Today, with a tractor-drawn drill you can seed at a proper rate and at uniform depth.

Many different types of tractors were produced in the USSR. They were the K-701 wheeled tractor powered by a 300 horse power engine, the T-150 crawler tractor, MTZ-80 wheeled tractor and many others. These tractors were used with different mounted and trailed farm machines for plowing, cultivating, harrowing, sowing and harvesting agricultural crops. At present modern types of tractors are used.

Wordlist

to plow (AmE)/ plough (BrE) – вспахивать, пахать

soil – почва, земля

to plant - сажать

seed – семя, зерно; seeds – семена

to cultivate – культивировать

to harvest - собирать урожай, жать

crop - урожай

lorry – грузовик

drill - сеялка

grain – зерно, хлебные злаки

corn picker – кукурузоуборочная машина

root - корнеплод

tuber – клубень

digger – копалка

etc. = et cetera - и т.д.

ear – початок

steel – стальной

to ride - ехать

wheel – колесо

tractor – drawn – на тракторной тяге

to broadcast – разбрасывать семена

seeder – рядовая сеялка

uniform – однородный, одинаковый

wheeled – колёсный

engine – двигатель

crawler – гусеничный

to trail - тащить(ся), волочить(ся), тянуть(ся) сзади

sow (sowed, sown) - сеять