Nevada County picayune., 1889-06-05
AGRICULTURAL.
The Farmers of the South Must
 Reform.

l What the farmers need IS Scif-rell- ance. Since the war they have be- come dependent on the farmers of the West to feed them; the mer- C ants to run { h c m; the m 0 nc y--l C Il q CTS to supply them with money; the ferti- lizer factories to furnish them manures; the drovers to furnish them mules and horses; and even North ern mechanics to furnish them with axe handles, in short, every Occupa- ton supplies them with all they have. How can the farmers succeed and prosper under such circumstances? The only wonder is they have been able to retain their farms and homes. This. most of them have done, but what are their conditions? Merely hewcrs of wood and drawers of water. All such must stop;a a thorough refor- nation must take place, or serfdom is their doom. How can reforma- ton be accomplished: Why merely by self-conviction. One must be convinced of his errors from expert euee he must feel and know he is , wrong. and when so convinced in his , own mind. then if he has resolution, he will abandon what he knows to be r wrong. and take a new line of depar- ture and rely on himself, and adopt asystem more ecomical and practical. The great error the farmers made after the war, was in trying to farm 8 for money. They overlooked the principles of farming, and that is, to make farming successful; the farm must be made self-supporting all those old methods were abandoned, :, raising food crops and stock-and cotton became the only crop, to make up all wants and defciences.
 The result was, failure and pover- ty; and instead of going back to old r methods and first principles, cotton E was held on to as the only chance of 5 making money, and retrieving ones losses, and it only made matters worse. This is, or should be, a les son of onviction-learncd from bit ter eXperience-and should lead to reformation. It is a practical lesson & that should appeal to ones good sense, and convince, and no sophis- try can gainsay it, and the farmer s only redemption is to go back to diversified farming, which was the mode of farming before the war, and make the farm self-supporting. l never abandon old methods; never had the cotton mania; made food crops my special object, hence never incurred debts. By this method l gained no notoriety as a farmer, but ' have lived comfortable, easy life. my advice to farmers is to cut loose from Western corn and meat, and make it yourself cut loose from com mercial fertilizers, and make all the manures you can, and run your farm : as economically as possible, and let 7 expensive machinery alone, until you can afford to buy such.
 The work of reformation has been begun with few, and their examples will have a good effect on others, especially with thoscw who are making stock-raising speciality, for stock insurcs grain and grass farms. and when IL comes to such farming, farms will improve, and the agricultural ; outlook will be more encouraging. i. Cotton crops will never draw our young men to the farm. But when they see beautiful stock farms, and stock, they will naturally be inclined 10 engage in such farming, for most persons fancy fine stock, and like . them; there is diversity and pleasure | in such farming, With cotton, it is year in and year out q monotonous drudge, it is q crop adapted only to slave labor, for it makes slaves of all who make It q special crop.
 Diversity our whole system of farming, and our sons will take to farming, and give up town pursuits. No one could blame them for choos- ing the towns to the cotton fields. Make farming interesting and they will come back to the farms John H. Dent, in Southern Cultivalor.
 --
 Where fine stock is kept barbed wire should not be used but if any , pasture is now fenced with that de- structye material, by blowing q fur row or two around the pasture, inside Al .I. ! 1f