HOW TO RESTORE A WORN-OUT FARM.
I have never yet seen a “worn-out” or “exhausted farm.” I know many
farms that are “run down.” I bought just such a farm a dozen or more
years ago, and I have been trying hard, ever since, to bring it up to a
profitable standard of productiveness--and am still trying, and expect
to have to keep on trying so long as I keep on farming. The truth is,
there never was a farm so rich, that the farmer did not wish it was
richer.
I have succeeded in making the larger part of my farm much more
productive than it ever was before, since it was cleared from the
original forest. But it is far from being as rich as I want it. The
truth is, God sent us into this world to work, and He has given us
plenty to do, if we will only do it. At any rate, this is true of
farming. He has not given us land ready to our hand. The man who first
cleared up my farm, had no easy task. He fairly earned all the good
crops he ever got from it. I have never begrudged him one particle of
the “natural manure” he took out of the land, in the form of wheat,
corn, oats, and hay. On the dry, sandy knolls, he probably got out a
good portion of this natural manure, but on the wetter and heavier
portions of the farm, he probably did not get out one-hundredth part of
the natural manure which the land contained.
Now, when such a farm came into my possession, what was I to do with it?
“Tell us what you did,” said the Doctor, “and then, perhaps, we can tell
you what you ought to have done, and what you ought to have left
undone.”
“I made many mistakes.”
“Amen,” said the Deacon; “I am glad to hear you acknowledge it.”
“Well,” said the Doctor, “it is better to make mistakes in trying to do
something, than to hug our self-esteem, and fold our hands in indolence.
It has been said that critics are men who have failed in their
undertakings. But I rather think the most disagreeable, and
self-satisfied critics, are men who have never done anything, or tried
to do anything, themselves.”
The Deacon, who, though something of an old fogy, is a good deal of a
man, and possessed of good common sense, and much experience, took these
remarks kindly. “Well,” said he to me, “I must say that your farm has
certainly improved, but you did things so differently from what we
expected, that we could not see what you were driving at.”
“I can tell you what I have been aiming at all along. 1st. To drain the
wet portions of the arable land. 2d. To kill weeds, and make the soil
mellow and clean. 3d. To make more manure.”
“You have also bought some bone-dust, superphosphate, and other
artificial manures.”
“True; and if I had had more money I would have bought more manure. It
would have paid well. I could have made my land as rich as it is now in
half the time.”
I had to depend principally on the natural resources of the land. I got
out of the soil all I could, and kept as much of it as possible on the
farm. One of the mistakes I made was, in breaking up too much land, and
putting in too much wheat, barley, oats, peas, and corn. It would have
been better for my pocket, though possibly not so good for the farm, if
I had left more of the land in grass, and also, if I had summer-fallowed
more, and sown less barley and oats, and planted less corn.
“I do not see how plowing up the grass land,” said the Deacon, “could
possibly be any better for the farm. You agricultural writers are always
telling us that we plow too much land, and do not raise grass and clover
enough.”
“What I meant by saying that it would have been better for my pocket,
though possibly not so good for the farm, if I had not plowed so much
land, may need explanation. The land had been only half cultivated, and
was very foul. The grass and clover fields did not give more than half a
crop of hay, and the hay was poor in quality, and much of it half
thistles, and other weeds. I plowed this land, planted it to corn, and
cultivated it thoroughly. But the labor of keeping the corn clean was
costly, and absorbed a very large slice of the profits. _But_ the corn
yielded a far larger produce per acre than I should have got had the
land lain in grass. And as all this produce was consumed on the farm, we
made more manure than if we had plowed less land.”
I have great faith in the benefits of thorough tillage--or, in other
words, of breaking up, pulverizing, and exposing the soil to the
decomposing action of the atmosphere. I look upon a good, strong soil
as a kind of storehouse of plant-food. But it is not an easy matter to
render this plant-food soluble. If it were any less soluble than it is,
it would have all leached out of the land centuries ago. Turning over,
and fining a manure-heap, if other conditions are favorable, cause rapid
fermentation with the formation of carbonate of ammonia, and other
soluble salts. Many of our soils, to the depth of eight or ten inches,
contain enough nitrogenous matter in an acre to produce two or three
thousand pounds of ammonia. By stirring the soil, and exposing it to the
atmosphere, a small portion of this nitrogen becomes annually available,
and is taken up by the growing crops. And it is so with the other
elements of plant-food. Stirring the soil, then, is the basis of
agriculture. It has been said that we must return to the soil as much
plant-food as we take from it. If this were true, nothing could be sold
from the farm. What we should aim to do, is to develop as much as
possible of the plant-food that lies latent in the soil, and not to sell
in the form of crops, cheese, wool, or animals, any more of this
plant-food than we annually develop from the soil. In this way the
“condition” of the soil would remain the same. If we sell _less_ than we
develop, the condition of the soil will improve.
By “condition,” I mean the amount of _available_ plant-food in the soil.
Nearly all our farms are poorer in plant-food to-day than when first
cleared of the original forest, or than they were ten, fifteen, or
twenty years later. In other words, the plants and animals that have
been sold from the farm, have carried off a considerable amount of
plant-food. We have taken far more nitrogen, phosphoric acid, potash,
etc., out of the soil, than we have returned to it in the shape of
manure. Consequently, the soil must contain less and less of plant-food
every year. And yet, while this is a self-evident fact, it is,
nevertheless, true that many of these self-same farms are more
productive now than when first cleared, or at any rate more productive
than they were twenty-five or thirty years ago.
Sometime ago, the Deacon and I visited the farm of Mr. Dewey, of Monroe
Co., N.Y. He is a good farmer. He does not practice “high farming” in
the sense in which I use that term. His is a good example of what I term
slow farming. He raises large crops, but comparatively few of them. On
his farm of 300 acres, he raises 40 acres of wheat, 17 acres of Indian
corn, and 23 acres of oats, barley, potatoes, roots, etc. In other
words, he has 80 acres in crops, and 220 acres in grass--not permanent
grass. He lets it lie in grass five, six, seven, or eight years, as he
deems best, and then breaks it up, and plants it to corn. The land he
intends to plant to corn next year, has been in grass for seven years.
He will put pretty much all his manure on this land. After corn, it will
be sown to oats, or barley; then sown to wheat, and seeded down again.
It will then lie in grass three, four, five, six, or seven years, until
he needs it again for corn, etc. This is “slow farming,” but it is also
good farming--that is to say, it gives large yields per acre, and a good
return for the labor expended.
The soil of this farm is richer to-day in _available_ plant-food than
when first cleared. It produces larger crops per acre.
Mr. D. called our attention to a fact that establishes this point. An
old fence that had occupied the ground for many years was removed some
years since, and the two fields thrown into one. Every time this field
is in crops, it is easy to see where the old fence was, by the short
straw and poor growth on this strip, as compared with the land on each
side which had been cultivated for years.
This is precisely the result that I should have expected. If Mr. D. was
a poor farmer--if he cropped his land frequently, did not more than
half-cultivate it, sold everything he raised, and drew back no manure--I
think the old fence-strip would have given the best crops.
The strip of land on which the old fence stood in Mr. Dewey’s field,
contained _more_ plant-food than the soil on either side of it. But it
was not available. It was not developed. It was latent, inert,
insoluble, crude, and undecomposed. It was so much dead capital. The
land on either side which had been cultivated for years, produced better
crops. Why? Simply because the stirring of the soil had developed _more_
plant-food than had been removed by the crops. If the stirring of the
soil developed 100 lbs. of plant-food a year, and only 75 lbs. were
carried off in the crops--25 lbs. being left on the land in the form of
roots, stubble, etc.--the land, at the expiration of 40 years, would
contain, provided none of it was lost, 1,000 lbs. more _available_
plant-food than the uncultivated strip. On the other hand, the latter
would contain 3,000 lbs. more actual plant-food per acre than the land
which had been cultivated--but it is in an unavailable condition. It is
dead capital.
I do not know that I make myself understood, though I would like to do
so, because I am sure there is no point in scientific farming of greater
importance. Mr. Geddes calls grass the “pivotal crop” of American
agriculture. He deserves our thanks for the word and the idea connected
with it. But I am inclined to think the _pivot_ on which our agriculture
stands and rotates, lies deeper than this. The grass crop creates
nothing--developes nothing. The untilled and unmanured grass lands of
Herkimer County, in this State, are no richer to-day than they were 50
years ago. The pastures of Cheshire, England, except those that have
been top-dressed with bones, or other manures, are no more productive
than they were centuries back. Grass alone will not make rich land. It
is a good “savings bank.” It gathers up and saves plant-food from
running to waste. It pays a good interest, and is a capital institution.
But the real source of fertility must be looked for _in the stores of
plant-food lying dormant in the soil_. Tillage, underdraining, and
thorough cultivation, are the means by which we develop and render this
plant-food available. Grass, clover, peas, or any other crop consumed on
the farm, merely affords us the means of saving this plant-food and
making it pay a good interest.