Fort Worth gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1891-1898, 1891-11-19
SMALLER FARMING

send you an article clipped from the Ty-
Ter Tex Record, which, 1 think, pretty
well covers everything with reference to
certain need IN Texas. In my opinion the
farmers of Texas would make much more
money for themselves were they to reduce
their acreage and farm better. L. L.
Tyler, Tex.
We have long been taking that same po-
sition. Extensive but imperfect farming is
certainly less profitable than d more con-
centrated effort on smaller acreage. The
article sent says in substance that it now
seems to be 4 notion quite generally pre-
vailing among the well informed agriculture
lists that, as rule, American farmers are
attempting to farm on too large scale for
their means. They have more on their
hands than they can attend to properly.
One has only to look about over The yoGntry
TO have himself convinced OF this fact. 1t
is not a thing confined to Texas, but one
meets with everywhere, especially in the
states of the South. The agricultural ed
itor OF the Memphis Appeal-Ava-
lanche is onto it, and in
a late editorial he says the small farmer
everywhere is generally doing better than
the large farmer. That this is true may be
easily proved by inquiring into the rel tive
prosperity of the forty-acre farmer and the
10O-acre farmer in your neighborhood
Which is burdened with the least debt in
proportion to the total value of his land?
Which is procuring the best profit upon his
capital and the largest money weld per
acre? And which gets the most salts faction
out of the business of agricultural One
grand reason why farming don't pay better
as whole than it has been paying, lies in
the fact that many of our farmers are too
grasping as regards land. They are trying
to work too much land and as a conse-
quence, are working no land well.
We, and particularly we of the South,
must have new agriculture, so to speak,
and that new agriculture must be on good
common sense. We must learn to work no
more land than we can work to entire per-
fiction We must Furthermore learn to
keep no more livestock than we can keep
well. The effort to maintain one head more
than this may destroy the profit of all We
must learn not to store perjshable produce
for rise when we are offered fair price.
Rats and mice can soon counter-balauce the
gain, even if it comes, and if the rats and
mice do not, then the interest may; and
then again, the rise may never come An
other item is that stock is matured when
ever it will sell at the top of the market.
After that point is reached you may easily
make gain in weight at loss Of profit.
''Quick sales" is as good an axiom for the
farmer as for the merchant The small
farmer is more apt to make these quick
sales than is the large farmer, and hence
his comparative gain on the amount Of
money invested in operations.
We fully indorse every word of this. The
days of extensive farming are practically
over, owing to the fact that the profits on
the large farm can no longer be made to
successfully compete with those of the
small farm The small farm is mainly man
aged by its owner, who does large proper
ton Of the work with his own hands, while
the manager Of the large farm must depend