That some 15,000,000 acres or more of formerly tilled land has been utterly destroyed by erosion in this country is but an insignificant part of the story, for it is the less violent form of erosional wastage, sheet erosion, that is doing the bulk of the damage to the land. The writer, after 24 years spent in studying the soils of the United States, is of the opinion that soil erosion is the biggest problem confronting the farmers of the Nation over a tremendous part of its agricultural lands. Adjustment of Agriculture to Its Environment. This was Bennett's presidential address to the Association of American Geographers. In other words, the treatment must fit not only the needs and adaptabilities of the land but the needs and adaptabilities of the farmer as well.
Soil conservation is probably the youngest of all the agricultural sciences.
Any other approach, no matter what it may be, always has and always must lead eventually to agricultural disaster. Too many people have lost sight of the fact that productive soil is essential to the production of food. If there were some standardized simple remedy for the ills of the land that could be applied indiscriminately, the job of soil conservation would be comparatively easy. But there is about as much variety in erosion and the performance of the water and wind as in the landscape of the country. Before any work is done, each farm or ranch is carefully analyzed, both as a piece of land and as a business enterprise.