River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1884-03-06
fiCTS sROUT SCOTCH FIFE.

FACTS sgOIT SCOTCH FIFE.
The Northwestern Miller has for
long time been fighting for the exclusive
use Of Scotch fife wheat for seed in the
northwest land Of No. hard, the
finest wheat in every way for milling
and tor making good flour in the world.
When fife wheat was first introduced
here, its great yield was its highest
recommendation. Millers could not
use it to advantage, and would not pay
as much for it as for club and other
soft varieties. The farmers, delighted
with its very prolific qualities insisted
on using fife for seed, and the result
shows their wisdom The difficulty of
grinding it contributed more than any
other single cause to the adoption of
new processes which have since been
perfected, so that to-day the best flour
known III the markets of the world is
made from the hard wheats of Minneso-
ia. Dakota and Manitoba. A history of
that fight and its consequences would
be interesting, but meager data and
lack of space forbidit publication here.
1t is we'll established fact that the
high reputation gained for Minnesota
flour in former years was attained by
using hard wheat exclusively in its pro-
duction. This gave it its great strength
over all other brands in the markets
When the middlings purifier first came
into general use here, the value of Min
nesota flour took long stride ahead
of any other brands then
produced, ranging in price in the east
ern'markets from 81. 100000 per barrel
above the winter wheat flour. At that
time Minnesota was raising purely
hard wheat (the old Scotch fifel, and
the extra value in the flour then was
evidently the result of using this hard
wheat exclusively in its production. 1t
is a fact, also. that the millers here were
then making money; a result to be at
tributed to the same cause-hard wheat.
For two or three years past change
has been coming over the condition of
things, and final results do not show up
as well. Some mills that were able to
show up net profits formerly of from
$50 900 to 800 900 year, have III the
past two wears lost on sunk money, and
in examining the flour reports in New
York. we see that there is now
margin Of only from fifteen to thirty
five cents per barrel in favor of Mime
sofa high grade flour, over the best win
ter wheat flour, instead of $3.50, as was
formerly obtained.
We have not far to go to discover the
cause for this. Six years ago new var
ieties of soft wheat were introduced in
Minnesota, and because they yielded
well, rapidly grew in favor with farmers.
The supply of hard wheat grew short
and millers were forced to mix with soft
grades to such an extent as to deterio-
rate the quality of their hours. Fife had
been sown year after year on the same
ground and there could be but one re-
sult-a heavy decrease in yield. This
experience has been repeated IN the case
of the soft varieties which supplanted
fife, and the ordinary farmer is now at
loss TO know what to do about seed
wheat. There is but one way out of the
woods. and that is to rest the soil by
pasturing it or planting it with some
thing besides wheat for two or three
years out of every ten.
1t is now some twenty years since
Scotch fife, which is the "fiinty fife
spring wheat" above referred to, was
| introduced in Minnesota, and since that
| time the progressive farmers of this very
progressive state have experimental
carefully and thoroughly with every va
riety of spring wheat known to agricul-
ture BY this means they have proven
conclusively that there is no soil which
Will grow the same quantity of wheat
each year for ten or twenty consecutive
seasons, unless it be in countries where
irrigation is practiced exclusively, or
where the same qualities drawn from
| the soil by wheat are an
nually replaced-the latter q
most costly and practically impossible
process. There are few sections IL
Minnesota where the farmers have
stuck to fife ever since it was intro
duced, and their crop this year was as
large and the quality as fine as the first
season that they raised fife. 1t is true
that they have not grown wheat on the
same ground every year. They have
given the soil an occasional rest, some
times for two or three years, first by
pasturing it, and then by planting
something else, so that it recovered
what it had lost. A single well anthem
ticated instance will serve as ample i'll
ustration: A veteran farmer in Eden
Prairie, Mimi, raised fife this year
which threshed out twenty
one bushels per acre, on
soil that was in corn last year and had
been pastured for two years previous to
planting to corn. A piece of land lying
beside the one under notice had been
in wheat every year for ten or more
years, and the yield this year was ten
bushels per acre, in place Of twenty
bushels ten years ago Every variety
of soft wheat has produced the same re-
suIts-a heavy yield for a few years,
with steady diminution, which in ten
years amounts to 50 and sometimes to
60 or 20 per cent, compared with the
first year.
When we come down to figures, W e
find that there is group of counties in
Minnesota in which large acreage of
fife wheat has been raised almost exclu-
sivelv ever since its introduction.
There are other counties which have
held on to fife, but the five here given
are selected because their large acreage
makes them most noteworthy.
The figures are as follows
CARVER COUNTY.
Total Total Average
Years acreage yield, bus. per acre.
1870 IS 500 2J6. 1874 1887
1871 15629 23O.646 14.76
1872 1854 352153 1890
1874 1888 3SI25g 1907
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