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It is the first business of every farmer to
reduce the fertility of the soil, by removing the largest crops of
which the soil is capable; but ultimate failure results for the
landowner unless provision is made for restoring and maintaining
productiveness. Every landowner should adopt for his land a
system of farming that is permanent,--a system under which the land
becomes better rather than poorer.
If the independent farmer is to adopt and
maintain permanent systems of profitable agriculture, he cannot accept
"parrot" instruction; he must know the why and wherefore, the reason
for doing things, and the ultimate effect of his agricultural practice
upon the productive power of the land. Every farm is an
independent enterprise in which the farmer himself is the
superintendent and general manager, and he must be able to direct the
business, even though he may be the only man to execute his own
plans. The agriculture of a state cannot be managed from a
central office. The landowner must think for the land.
The author is familiar with the often
expressed idea that what the farmer wants is a simple statement of
facts, but he is even more familiar with the absolute truth that what
the farmer demands is the most positive proof of the correctness of
such statement before he is willing to make any change from a practice
based upon long experience.
In the preparation of this book free use has
been made of such technical terms as are necessary to the discussion of
fundamental principles with scientific correctness. No apology is
offered for this. Farmers and agricultural students have at least
as good intellects as other classes of people; and if when they leave
the farm they can learn to understand and manage successfully such
lines of business as banking, contracting, building, operating
railroads, factories, and other commercial establishments,--
xviii Introduction
which they are doing everywhere,--they can also understand their own
business, if they will, when they remain on the farm or in control of
land.
Technical books are to be studied; they are
not written for entertainment. They furnish definite facts,
accurate data, and necessary information, relating to underlying
principles upon which permanent successful practice must be based.
The most important material problem of the
United States is to maintain the fertility of the soil, and no
extensive agricultural country has ever solved this problem. The
frequent periods of famine and starvation in the great agricultural
countries of China, India, and Russia, and the depleted lands and
abandoned farms of our own eastern United States are facts that serve
as a constant proof that the common practice of agriculture reduces the
productive power of land.
The rule is almost universal that old land is
less productive than new land. This simple and well-recognized
fact points inevitably toward future poverty, not only for the
individual or the family, but likewise for the commonwealth and for the
nation. We may ignore this if we choose in America for a few more
years, but with the decreasing productive power of our lands and with a
rapidly increasing population the truth must strike us in the face in
the near future.
We cannot afford to let ignorance, prejudice,
or bigotry blind us in this matter, neither in ourselves nor in
others. Even the confident assurance, by those who live in
continued plenty, that the people of earth are not destined to suffer
hunger, does not remove the positive fact that thousands,and sometimes
millions, of people actually die of starvation within a single year in
some of the old agricultural countries.
An early recognition of these world-wide
conditions and tendencies is of paramount importance to the people
controlling the more productive lands of the united States, not only
for their own sake, but also for the sake of others who are dependent
upon those lands for their present and future support, whether engaged
directly in agricultural pursuits or in other industrial or
professional lines, which cannot exist and prosper without agriculture.
If the art of agriculture has ruined land, the science of agricul-
Introduction xix
ture must restore it; and the restoration must begin while some farmers
are still prosperous, for poverty-stricken people are at once helpless
and soon ignorant. Outside help will always be required to redeem
impoverished soils, for poverty makes no investments, and some initial
investment is always required for soil improvement.
It is the purpose of this book to teach the
science of soil fertility and permanent agriculture, chiefly by
reporting facts rather than by offering theories; and any one of common
sense who reads the English language, and who can understand the common
school arithmetic, can understand this book if he will study it.
(The fact may well be recognized that some who have ample time for
study, though physically industrious, are mentally lazy.1)
The author suggests, however, that the busy
farmer, who wishes to familiarize himself as quickly as possible with
the most essential practical facts pertaining to the economical and
permanent improvement of common or normal soils, and who is willing to
pass over temporarily the discussion of foundation principles, may well
begin the study of this book with "Systems of Permanent Agriculture,"
Part II, after first making the following facts a part of his ever
ready knowledge:
(1) Phosphorus and decaying organic
matter are the two substances which constitute the key to profitable
systems of permanent agriculture on most of the normal soils of
America; although, when soils become sour, or acid, ground natural
limestone should also be regularly applied, at the rate of about two
tons per acre every four to six years.
(2) There are six essential positive factors in crop production: the seed, a home for the plant, the food of which the plant is made (and this factor is just as important for plants as it is for animals), moisture, heat, and light.
Of these six factors, the least appreciated and the most neglected is
that of plant food, and yet this is a factor which the farmer can very
largely control, whereas the others (except the seed) are largely
beyond his control. (An important negative factor is protection from weeds, insects, and disease.)
1 "Many poor farmers have a lazy
faith in the Lord; they think or hope that He will somehow make up for
whatever they fail to do."--Hoard.
xx Introduction
(3) Of the ten different chemical
elements absolutely required for the growth of every agricultural
plant, three come directly from air and water in practically unlimited
amounts, and these three (carbon and oxygen from air and hydrogen from
water) constitute about 95 per cent of the common mature crops.
Nevertheless, each one of the seven elements obtained from the soil,
though aggregating only 5 per cent, is absolutely necessary to the life
and full development of the plant. Indeed, if any one of these
elements be entirely lacking, the soil would be infertile and
barren. So important are these plant-food elements, that soils
are found so deficient in some essential plant food that the addition
of a single element will more than double the crop yield.
(4) The five elements, potassium,
magnesium, calcium, iron, and sulfur, are contained in most normal
soils in such large amounts, compared to the requirements of crops,
that the supply rarely becomes depleted. Thus, in most cases, the
problem is narrowed to the two elements, nitrogen and phosphorus,
although, for various reasons, potassium also has come to have a
recognized money value in commercial fertilizers.
(5) Nitrogen is contained in the air in
inexhaustible amount, but the legumes (clover, alfalfa, peas, beans,
etc.) are the only agricultural plants which have power to utilize the
free nitrogen of the air. Nitrogen in limited amount is contained
in the soil in the organic matter, the principal material which gives a
good soil its dark color. If the supply of organic matter is
maintained, by plowing under farm manure, clover, cowpeas, or other
green manures, then the supply of nitrogen will also be maintained.
(6) The plowed soil of an acre (2
million pounds, for a depth of 6 2/3 inches) of rich, well-balanced
normal land in the Corn Belt contains about 8000 pounds of nitrogen,
2000 pounds of phosphorus, 35,000 pounds of potassium, and 15 tons of
calcium carbonate (limestone).
(7) The surface soils of the United
States vary in composition: (a) in nitrogen content, from 1000
pounds to 35,000 pounds; (b) in phosphorus content, from 160 pounds to
15,000 pounds; (c) in potassium content from 3000 pounds to 60,000
pounds, per acre; and many soils not only contain no lime, but are
markedly acid and thus require heavy applications of lime, while some
pro-
Introduction xxi
ductive soils contain as much as 20 per cent of calcium carbonate, corresponding to 200 tons of limestone per acre.
(8) A 100-bushel crop of corn takes from
the soil about 100 pounds of nitrogen, 17 pounds of phosphorus, and 19
pounds of potassium, in the grain, and about 48, 6, and 52 pounds of
these respective elements in the stalks or stover.
(9) One ton of average fresh farm manure
contains about 10 pounds of nitrogen, 2 pounds of phosphorus, and 8
pounds of potassium; and 100 pounds of the most common "complete"
commercial fertilizer contains about 2 pounds of nitrogen, 4 pounds of
phosphorus, and 2 pounds of potassium.
(10) One ton of clover hay contains
about 40 pounds of nitrogen, 5 pounds of phosphorus, and 30 pounds of
potassium. When grown on soil of fair productive capacity, the
roots and stubble of the clover plant contain no more nitrogen than the
soil has furnished to the plant; but for each ton of clover plowed
under, the soil is enriched by about 40 pounds of nitrogen.
(11) Roughly estimated, the plant food
liberated from an average soil during an average season with average
farming is equivalent to about 2 per cent of the nitrogen, 1 per cent
of the phosphorus, and 1/4 of 1 per cent of the potassium, contained in
the surface stratum (about 6 2/3 acre inches, or 2 million pounds of
average soil).
(12) As an average in live-stock
farming, the animals retain about one fourth of the nitrogen and
phosphorus and destroy two thirds of the organic matter of the food
consumed, and large loss is likely to occur in the manure produced,
especially in nitrogen and organic matter, a loss of one half of these
constituents being easily possible during three or four months, in part
from fermentation, which may occur even under cover, and in part from
leaching where the manure is exposed to the weather or where too little
absorbent bedding is used.
(13) It is less difficult to maintain or
increase the organic matter of the soil by means of legume crops and
crop residues in a good rotation for grain farming than in any system
of live-stock farming which does not include the purchase of feed.
(14) Some satisfactory rotation plans
for grain farmers are wheat, corn, oats, and clover; or wheat, corn,
and cowpeas; or
xxii Introduction
cotton, corn, and oats and cowpeas. The first of these is a
four-year rotation which should include a catch crop of clover seeded
the first year and plowed under for corn as late as practicable in the
spring of the second year. The other two are three-year
rotations, and they should also include legume catch crops wherever
practicable. In each rotation for grain farming, all products are
to be returned to the soil excepting the grain, or seed, and the cotton
lint. Either the whole cotton seed or the hulls and meal should
also be returned for fertilizer.
(15) In live-stock farming the feeding
should be done on the fields so far as practicable, and manure produced
in the barn should be hauled and spread in the fresh condition so far
as possible. Sufficient bedding should be used to absorb all of
the liquid excrement, which is as valuable, ton for ton, as the solid
excrement.
(16) To insure the maintenance of the
phosphorus content of the soil where large crops are produced, about 20
pounds of phosphorus per acre for each year in the rotation should be
applied in grain farming and about 10 pounds per acre in live-stock
farming (aside from that returned in the manure). To enrich the
soil in phosphorus, heavier applications should be made for a time.
(17) The average investment required for
25 pounds of phosphorus is about 75 cents in 200 pounds of fine-ground
natural rock phosphate of good grade, about $2.50 in 200 pounds of good
steamed bone meal, about $3.00 in 400 pounds of good acid phosphate,
about $6.00 in 600 pounds of the average "complete" commercial
fertilizer, and about $80 in manure made from corn costing 40 cents a
bushel. The natural phosphate, if ground to pass through a sieve
with 10,000 meshes to the square inch, gives satisfactory results when
applied in liberal amounts (as 1000 pounds per acre every three or four
years), if used in connection with decaying organic matter in
sufficient amount to maintain the nitrogen.
(18) Potassium salts are used with very
great profit on soils positively deficient in that element, as on most
well-drained extensive peaty swamp lands; and soluble salts, such as
kainit, may produce some profit for a time if used in connection with
phosphorus on soils deficient in decaying organic matter, even where
the total supply of potassium in the soil is very large.
(19) Commercial nitrogen can usually be
used with profit in market gardening, in cotton growing, and sometimes
in the production of timothy hay near large cities; or, as a rule,
wherever the gross returns from an acre of produce exceeds $50 or $75.
(20) As a rule, commercial nitrogen
cannot be used with profit for the production of the staple grain
crops, such as corn and wheat, although under some conditions small
applications of nitrogen alone or with other elements, as in the
ordinary so-called "complete" fertilizer, may stimulate the plants
sufficiently to enable them to draw more heavily upon the soil, and
thus return apparent temporary profit in a system of ultimate land ruin.
And other seed fell on good ground, and sprang up, and bare fruit an hundred fold.--Jesus.
I applied mine heart to know, and to search,
and to seek out wisdom, and the reason of things.--Solomon.
Every man shall receive his own reward
according to his own labor; for we are laborers together with
God.--Paul.
Copyright © 2007 by Tumbledown Farm