Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1885-09-21
AorienltMTal department.
DIVERSIFIED AGRICULTURE.

ana Farmer. / believe in mixed
farming. wish it understood, how
ever, that by this l do not mean that
a farmer should try to grow every
thing which he knows can be profit
ably grown in his latitude, for the
one who attempts this must be a man
of rare executive ability OF he will
make failure. What | mean by
mixed farming is that the farmer
should not rely on one product alone
for his income, but so manage his
farm that he will have several prod
ucts to sell. In determining what
shall be the main source of income
one ought to carefully consider any
point connected with the particular
product, as, for example, cost of
production, amount of help needed
to get it ready for market, probable
competition, prices at which the arti-
Gle has been sold in former years, it's
keeping qualities, and his ability to
hold it for higher prices if desirable,
effect on the soil, etc. l am per-
suaded that much of the failure to
make farming profitable, and the
push and worry connected with farm
life, come from a failure to wisely
plan and consider the probabilities
Of the future. The folly of depend
ing on single product has been H.
Illustrated in wheat-growing regions
where a failure of this crop has
brought whole communities to the
verge of bankruptcy in the great
corn-growing localities, where the
farmer who depended on hogs alone
for his income has lost his entire
herd with cholera among the fruit
growers, who, by overproduction,
have brought the price of some par
ticular variety below the cost of
production, or who have lost an en-
tire crop by week OF two of bad
weather at marketing time, and where
tobacco, cotton or some special crop
has been grown to exclusion. An
other common cause of loss and wor-
ry is the carrying of mixed farming
to too great an extent and thus over
burdening ourselves, so that unless
the season prove an unusually good
one the farmer is sure to get behind
with his work and then the year will
prove hopeless struggle with weeds.
There is vast difference between
having a job done at the right time,
or leaving it a week or two later,
when that job is killing weeds, and
any farmer who would think little
in planning his summers work would
know that he is liable at any time to
have a week or more of wet weather
in which he can do nothing in his
crops, but that this is the very time
in which the weeds will do wonders.
I have in mind now a farmer of my
acquaintance who depends entirely
on hired help to run his farm, and
who started in the spring without
ready cash to pay help, who has I'M
dertaken to combine farming, gar
dening and nursery growing. He
has fourth-acre of beets, something
more than this of onions, some two
acres of sweet potatoes, an acre OF
cucumbers for pickles, one acre OF
nursery seedlings, which require
great care, six OF eight acres of pc,
tatoes, an acre of strawberries, about
two acres of raspberries, forty-five
acres of corn, besides oats, wheat
meadow and pasture. Now this is
running mixed farming to extremes
and makes it almost sure that a
some season of the year he will bt
swamped with weeds, for with 81
large an acreage to keep clean will
the hoe, if the weeds once get :
start the work will be more thai
doubled.
What do l mean by mixed farm
ing? Simply that one should SO ar
range as to have several sources o
income, and to combine stock AM
grain growing, so as to consume o.
, the farm the bulky products an
, furnish sufficient manure and enabl
+ the farmer to keep fair share O
his land in grass, so as to grow So
to furnish plant food, and that h
should raise enough stock to keep u
f the home supply and have some t
sell. We will suppose the farmer t
own 100 acres of land. seventy-iv
of which is tillable, the balanc
woodland and permanent pasture
Twenty-Five of this should be
clover and ten in timothy for meaC
ow, which leaves forty under til
pillow. Now from fifteen to twent
of this should be in wheat and oat
and the same amount in corn and pt
tatoes. One team would easily
all the blowing, as it would be d
vided between spring and fall. I'll
rotation which would give sod ie
to pillow each year would prevent Il
IL field from becoming weedy, and Wi
e our modern tools the crops could
/ kept clean without the hoe. I'll
i farmer could sell few hogs, shee
% and cattle each year, and his whe
II and potatoes would bring cash in
l. lump, while the fruit, poultry, al
dairy products would 60 far iowa
of paying his store bills. 1t won
+, probably pay him to keep three hon
d es to do his breaking and enable hi