ON THE GOVERNMENT’S FARM
To me Truro had a twofold interest. The first was that
it was the chief scene of the propaganda of that extraordinary
Irishman, Colonel M’Nutt, who figures so largely
in that Romance of Emigration which some day I am
going to write; and it is the theatre of that admirable new
institution, new, so far as New Scotland is concerned, the
Agricultural College and Government Experimental Farm.
After spending some days on this farm, I make bold
to say that, in the hands of the zealous and energetic
Professor Cumming, it is the best thing I saw in New
Scotland, and, considering everything, one of the most
perfect institutions of its kind on earth.
[Illustration: MAIN HALL—NOVA SCOTIA AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE.]
What a great advantage it is to come late! You
benefit by the mistakes and the achievements of your forerunners.
That is why, to take an instance at random,
Budapest in the domain of hospital and urban sanitation is
so superior to London. The Hungarians were thousands
of miles behind the times a decade or two ago; when
they decided to go ahead they were untrammelled by
customs, habits, systems, and expensive old plants. From
having nothing at all they acquired the best, the latest
appliances of science. For generations Nova Scotia has
been tinkering at agriculture. The soil of the province
is so varied that the early pioneers did not know what to
make of it. What would suit one part was hopeless in
another. Instead of settling down, farmers migrated from
one district, from one country to another. Some who sold
their farms profited, others, who for want of application
and also for want of knowledge, fared worse, until it was
difficult for a stranger to ascertain with any sort of precision
just what were the agricultural possibilities of the
Province. Ninety years ago an enthusiastic agriculturist,
John Young, published a remarkable series of letters under
the _nom de plume_ of “Agricola,” in which he gathered
together all the current English ideas on the subject of
scientific farming, and earnestly urged their adoption by
his fellow-countrymen. These letters of Agricola in book
form attracted wide attention. Young did more: he set
about the forming and consolidation of agricultural societies
throughout Nova Scotia, at which prizes were offered
for stock cereals and vegetables, and for a time agriculture
undoubtedly benefited. But many causes, external and internal,
conspired to render farming in Nova Scotia a far
less prosperous undertaking than it deserved to be. The
constant exodus of the young men from the farms was a
serious handicap; so was the exclusion of produce from
the American markets, the remoteness of some possible
markets, and the scantiness of others nearer home. But
still the great obstacle to success was want of knowledge
and want of method.
Some twenty-one years ago there was organised in the
Province of Nova Scotia an Agricultural School, which
achieved some excellent work, but which, owing to the lack
of equipment, did not make the impression which might
have been made had the institution been dealt with in a
more generous manner. There was also carried on from
the year 1896 a School of Horticulture at Wolfeville, which,
like its sister institution in Truro, was carried on a rather
too modest scale. However, after studying the institution
at Guelph, and consulting with the professors at that institution,
and with Dr. James Robertson, then Dominion
Commissioner for Agriculture, the Government of Nova
Scotia decided to incorporate these two institutions into one
Agricultural College. This institution was formally opened
in February 1905, under the principalship of Mr. Melville
Cumming, a native of Nova Scotia, and a graduate of
Dalhousie University, Halifax, and of the Ontario Agricultural
College at Guelph. The faculty was composed of the
Principal of the old School of Agriculture, the Principal of
the School of Horticulture, the Superintendent of the
Provincial Government Farm, together with lecturers from
the Provincial Normal School, with which institution the
College is affiliated. In addition, the service of some of
the leading men at Guelph and Ottawa have, from time to
time, been secured, especially to assist in the short courses.
Beginning with an enrolment in the regular course of
fifteen students, and in the short courses of sixty-eight,
the College has in these years advanced to an enrolment
of seventy-seven in the full course, and three hundred and
forty-two students in the short course, and this, it must be
remembered, in a constituency scarcely one-tenth larger than
that from which the Ontario Agricultural College draws
its pupils. While the College is primarily a Nova Scotian
institution, yet its doors are thrown open to students from
all the Maritime Provinces, the opportunity being taken
advantage of by the young farmers of Prince Edward Island
and New Brunswick to the extent of sixteen and twenty-one
students respectively. It is, moreover, the hope of
those who are most interested in the institution that it
shall become, in name as well as in fact, the Maritime
College of Agriculture.
The College was purposely located in the same town,
Truro, as the Provincial Normal School, in order that the
teaching staff at the latter institution might come in
contact with the technical teaching of agriculture, and that,
in turn, the agricultural students might profit from the
literary and scientific teaching of the members of the
Normal School faculty. As a further effort at affiliation
of the forces of these institutions, for the purpose of improving
conditions in the rural schools, there is held each
summer during the school vacation a School of Science,
classes of which are held at the Agricultural College
building, the instructors being composed of men from
the faculties of these institutions, assisted by some of the
leading men engaged in scientific teaching in Canada. The
importance of this affiliation can scarcely be overestimated,
for, unless the College is in close touch with the rural
schools, and unless the scholars at these schools are directed
towards the College, neither can prove as effective in bettering
rural conditions as it is desirable for them to be.
The equipment of the College is much the same,
although not as extensive, as is to be seen at Guelph and
other centres of agricultural education. However, under
the conditions described above, it is only natural that the
outstanding feature of the institution should be its live
stock equipment. In the stables on the College Farm, and,
in some cases, in stables in other parts of the Province, but
owned by the College, are to be found one of the finest
collections of live stock which has been gathered together in
any part of the Dominion, There are herds of Holsteins,
Ayrshires, Jerseys, Shorthorns, and Herefords, composed of
outstanding individuals, and headed by some of the best
sires to be found in Canada. The Holstein herd of cows
averaged last year 13,500 pounds of milk.
In the horse stables are to be found animals of famous
lineage and splendid specimens of their breed. There are
seven pure bred Clydesdale mares, three having been extensive
prize-winners in Scotland. The College at present
owns three Clydesdale stallions.
Equal attention has been paid to the selection of swine
and poultry, so that, taken altogether, the live stock
equipment at the College is such as to afford splendid
ideas for the students in attendance, and also to effect
improvement in the general character of the stock of the
Province.
[Illustration: AT KINGSPORT.]
[Illustration: “CALLING” A MOOSE.]
“Each Province in Canada,” observed Professor Cumming
to me, “has its own peculiar agricultural conditions and
problems, and before one can pronounce judgment upon
the degree of progress which each has made, he must
understand the special conditions under which the people
have been working.” Nova Scotia, as has been said, is a
province of varied resources, in the forests, the seas, and the
mines. While these various natural resources have added
largely to the wealth of the Province, yet their presence
cannot be termed an unmitigated blessing. There is a
tendency for the people to direct their energies in too many
avenues of employment, and a corresponding lack of continuity,
especially in methods of agriculture. There are
exceptions, for example in the fruit-growing counties and
in local areas in various parts, where the people have
adhered strictly to agriculture. But there are thousands
enrolled in the census as farmers who have little more right
to be included in that class than has the porter in an office
to be called a lawyer or a doctor. As, however, the forests
are increasing, and the pursuit of the sea and mines are
becoming more specialised, those who are living on the
lands are taking a greater interest in the subject of agriculture,
and are seeking such information which will help
them to improve their conditions.
One great enemy of agriculture in New Scotland is the
natural tendency of the farmer’s sons to migrate to the
south or the west. The proximity and easy accessibility of
Boston and other large American cities was long irresistible,
just as London and England allured the youth of Old
Scotland. But the trend of western immigration must
sometime cease, and life in American cities is proving less
lucrative than of yore, the result being a marked tendency
on the part of the young men of the Province to devote
themselves to farming.
The type of farming long favoured in Nova Scotia was
that which minimised the amount of labour required, except
at those seasons of the year when seeds must be sown and
harvests reaped. As a consequence, one saw herds of live
stock, too small in numbers, often of inferior quality, and
still more indifferently kept. The selling of hay and oats,
and roots of all kinds, was found an easier solution of the
difficulties of farming than raising live stock, and the selling
of butter, and cream, and milk, beef, eggs, and other animal
products. Many an impoverished field and many a run-out
farm still greets the traveller, robbed of its virgin wealth of
humus, and of the elements of plant food. The cure for
this is live stock and live stock alone, and this is the gospel
which Professor Cumming is preaching.
Of course, in the fruit areas of Hants, King’s, and
Annapolis counties, this want is not so keenly felt. Green
crops, like clover, peas, and vetches, are grown and ploughed
under to supply humus with which to improve the physical
condition, and nitrogen with which to increase the plant
food of the soil, on which the apples, and plums, and other
fruits are grown. But even here more live stock is a
necessity.
For the development of a high type of agriculture
Nova Scotia offers most favourable conditions. About the
only drawback, as compared with the inland parts of Canada,
is a somewhat protracted spring, a drawback which frequent
showers of rain and moist conditions natural to any maritime
province, largely mitigate. Live stock, when properly
cared for, flourishes to an unusual degree, and the markets
for all kinds of agriculture produce are not only unusually
good but easily accessible—so easy of access, in fact, as to
have oft-times prevented successful co-operation, especially
in butter and cheese making. For when a farmer can find
within a few miles of his door a population of miners who
will buy his products and pay him cash on delivery, he is
often discouraged if he has to wait for a little longer to
receive his returns from a creamery. The result of this has
been to promote private dairying and private marketing of
all sorts of produce at the expense of the more desirable,
and, in the end, more profitable system of co-operative
manufacture and marketing.
Dairying might well prosper here. Pastures, when properly
cared for, are good and well watered, cows do well
under the moist, humid conditions which prevail, and
should the local market for dairy products ever become
over-supplied, no province has easier access to the markets
of the outside world. Beef cattle, too, have their place,
especially in proximity to the large tracts of inexhaustibly
fertile dike marsh lands, lining the headwaters of the
Bay of Fundy and its river tributaries. There are also
isolated river valleys where cheap pastures afford the means
of raising beef at a minimum cost. Sheep find the land
most congenial, and when well bred and cared for, the
sheep of Nova Scotia will rival those of any other part
of Canada. But for more than one reason sheep-raising
has not been sufficiently exploited, although according to
the census of 1907 it has made more progress during
the past half decade than the forty years previously.
Horses, and swine, and poultry, as might also be expected,
have their place in Nova Scotian agriculture, and, under
efficient treatment, will give as good an account of
themselves as in Ontario or any of the older provinces
of Canada.
In the matter of crops New Scotland is peculiarly
adapted to the production of hay and roots. The large
marsh and interval areas produce heavy crops of hay, and
nowhere in America can one see finer fields of turnips
than on some of these maritime farms. In a recent
bulletin issued by the Department of Agriculture on
“Root-Growing in Nova Scotia,” there are recorded replies
from twenty-five representative farmers living in various
parts of the Province, from whose records it appears that
the minimum yield of roots per acre for the last year
was 600 bushels, with a maximum of 1200 bushels, and
an average of 864 bushels. Despite, however, the splendid
facilities for growing roots, many farmers, because of the
reasons already hinted at, devote little or none of their
acreage to this most profitable crop. Although there are
exceptions, yet, for the most part, the cereal crops do not
flourish to quite the same degree as further inland, and corn,
whether grown for ears or ensilage, is generally an uncertain
crop. The Federal Department has already in operation
an extensive experimental farm, operated for the benefit
of the Maritime Provinces, at Nappan, N.S. Truro,
labouring under the disadvantage of being outside of the
so-called fruit-growing areas, will have its work well supplemented
by the establishment of this station.
In addition to that which is carried on within the
College ground, a strong effort is being made to promote
College extension work. Recently one hundred of the
leading farmers of the Province, together with representative
men from the adjoining Provinces, co-operated
with the College authorities in testing varieties of grain,
grown singly and in mixture, and also in testing nitro-bacteria
for various leguminous crops. This latter line of
investigation has already been carried on for three years,
and has been productive of some striking results.
An extensive series of institute meetings, addressed
by members of the College staff, successful farmers in Nova
Scotia, and some of the Ontario men, are regularly carried
on. There is a Farmers’ Association, which holds a three-days’
annual meeting in different parts of the Province, and
a Fruit-Growers’ Association, which holds regular meetings
in the fruit sections of the Province. In addition, each
county, with a few exceptions, has a regularly organised
County Farmers’ Association, whose object it is to promote
the educational campaign, and to deliberate upon matters
of common interests.
But perhaps the most aggressive and successful body
of organised farmers is constituted in the agricultural
societies, of which there are 200, situated all over the
Province. Under the auspices of the various agricultural
societies and associations of the Province, the various
members of the Agricultural College staff lecture and give
demonstrations on improved agriculture. Co-operative
experiments in crops, methods of cultivation, fertilisation,
and soil inoculation are being directed from the College.
A series of model orchards, thirty-five in number, have
been established in the various counties of the Province,
from Cape Breton in the east to Yarmouth in the west,
and are under the direct supervision of the horticulturist
at the College. Insect and fungus pests, such as the
brown-tailed moth, are being studied and kept in control
through the efforts of the biologist and other members
of the College faculty. The principal object for which
these agricultural societies exist is the improvement of live
stock. Each society keeps from one to sometimes six or
more pure-bred bulls. These societies are bonused by the
Government to the extent, during the present year, of
76 cents for each dollar subscribed by the members of these
societies. Now new lines of work are opening up, of which
perhaps the most interesting is the campaign which is being
organised to encourage the more extensive draining of farm
lands.
Authorities who have studied the matter carefully are
convinced that money judiciously invested in the under-drainage
of farm lands will return from 15 to 50 per cent.
or more per annum on the investment. Many of our
own best farmers already know this from experience; but
there are a great many farms in the Province of Nova
Scotia sadly in need of drainage, which are to-day yielding
unprofitable crops because they have not been drained.
With a view to encouraging the under-drainage of these
lands, the College, I was told, are about to supply at a
nominal cost men who will survey and take levels of fields
which it is purposed to drain, and give advice in regard
to the most efficient means of doing this. To further
facilitate the matter, the College has bought, at the cost of
several thousand dollars, the most improved drainage machine
that is to-day on the market. The College authorities are
constantly on the alert to push forward progressive measures
of all kinds.
[Illustration: TRURO—THE “JOE HOWE FALLS.”]
During the visit a year or so since of Earl Grey to
the Agricultural College, the Hon. Sydney Fisher, then
Dominion Minister of Agriculture, said that the exhibition
of live stock which he saw there was the best he had ever
seen at any of the public institutions in the whole Dominion.
Mr. Fisher being himself a farmer, and owning one of the
best live stock farms in the Province of Quebec, no one in
Canada is more competent to pronounce judgment upon
such matters. Mr. Fisher further added, “You have taken
me entirely by surprise, for although Minister of Agriculture
for Canada, and more or less in touch with its agricultural
institutions, yet I had not realised that you of the East have
been advancing as rapidly as I now observe.”
I find I have said nothing of the flourishing town of
Truro itself—of its shaded streets and pleasant people.
After all, the Government Farm and Agricultural College
is its chief title to distinction.
A few miles from Truro, and at the eastern end of the
Cobequid Mountains, are the chief iron deposits of this port
of New Scotland. Londonderry reminds us once more of
the native town of that ubiquitous pioneer, Colonel M’Nutt,
and from this place a branch railway runs to the Acadia
mines and iron works. Stages also run to this busy industrial
centre and to great village Economy and Five Islands. The
Londonderry iron has been pronounced to be almost equal
to the Swedish for steel manufacture; the mines yield both
limonite and spathic ores.