I have found in the course of a long experience, that a foundation
eleven or twelve feet wide and eighteen or twenty feet long, and a stack
built in the form of an ellipse, and so as to contain ten or twelve
large loads, to be the most convenient and economical. Grain can be put
into a stack of this size much more rapidly than in small stacks. If a
stack is built much larger it will require more labor to pass the
bundles across the stack, and will have to be carried much higher before
it is topped out, which takes time and hard work.
The elliptical form I have found the best; with a load driven to the
side of the stack, the pitcher is never very far from the stacker; the
stack is easily kept balanced, and at threshing time the grain is
readily got to the machine. In a round stack of the same size, the
stacker gets farther away from the pitcher, and it requires more skill
to keep a round stack properly balanced; but if a round stack, after it
is finished and settled, looks like an egg standing erect on the large
end, that is good enough; it will not take water, and looks well, too.
A square stack, or one with corners, is easily kept balanced, but in
turning the corners there is too much fullness at the heads of the
bundles, and when the stack settles there will usually be a sag on each
side to catch water.
Two stakes, one eight and the other ten rods away, and in line with the
center of foundation, will sometimes assist the stacker in keeping his
stack well balanced, for at a glance he can tell whether the center is
in line with the stakes. A man may build, as his fancy dictates, either
round, elliptical or square, but in _all_, the same general principles
_must_ be observed--the lower part of the stack built straight up; put
in a bulge which settles down around and nearly conceals the lower part,
leaving the center of the bulge high; filling the middle to support the
center of the top. These are the principles on which good stacking
depends. If a man gets them well fixed in his mind and discards the idea
that he must keep the middle full from the ground up, he will have but
little damaged grain, even in the very worst of seasons. Very small
stacks should be built like ordinary stack tops.
A boy to hand bundles is usually more damage than good until a stack is
half built, and then he should not be allowed to stand on outside
course. If practical, drive alternate loads on opposite sides of the
stack; this is very desirable, but if, from the nature of surroundings,
it is necessary to drive all on one side, draw the top of the stack over
a foot or two towards the side where the unloading is done, and keep it
a little the lowest; the opposite side will settle considerably the
most, which will leave the stack straight up.