The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1891-03-23
Better Farming Needed.

Part of the responsibility for the depres-
sion in agricultural prosperity, says the
american CuLtiUator, probably rests upon
farmers themselves. 1t may seem a hard
saying to men who have doubtless greatly
improved on olden methods to tell them
that even these are not good enough. We
believe, however, that this is the trnth.
Low as prices have cen, farmers who had
the money, skill and capacity to diversity
their products have been able to make some
or them pay. As they have found some
parts Of their business prof able these have
been extended and the less profitable por-
tons have been left TO those VINO could not
or would not take extra pains needed to
make the required changes. What the best
farmers have thus done is st what saga
cious men in other branches Of business are
always DOR &. Merchants and manufact-
urers study both the market and their
natural advantage for supplying them. If
enythi does not pay they drop it as soon
as they can, and go to producing or dealing
IN that which does pay.
The obstacle which interferes with most
farmers pursuing this same policy is too
much and too poor land, too poor class of
stock and too little working capital in every
respect. The farmer who cultivates more
acres than he can make the best use of is
j
year after year he puts his field in crops
hat can be grown with least labor, because
his land is not rich enough for other
crops, what wonder is it If he does
not get even days wages for the
labor that has to be done2 If be
milKs cows that under his management
do not yield $50 pounds of butter per year,
and makes even that of poor quality, it is
not the fault of low prices that his doing
business does not pay. If prices of dairy
products are advanced, SO also will be the
cost of feeding his cows, and he will be no
better off than before. 1t is just as impos-
sible to make a condition of markets where
the enterprising farmer who keeps good
cows ana makes the best class of butter
shall not have an advantage, as it would be
TO make poor quality of windfall fruit sell
equally high with that Of the best varieties
carefully hand-picked and put up in taste
ful packages.
What is needed to make farmers more
generally successful is that they learn and
practise better methods Most farmers
would do better if they had less land to
work, provided they applied TO the remain
der as much labor, capital and skill as they
aow give to the larger area. Money is not
in these days made by land, but by the
labor applied in working it. Thousands of
market gardeners succeed by this concen-
tration of their efforts on a small area. They
early learn to grow the kind of crops
adapted to their ability to properly care for q,
and only when they have abundant capital
will they extend their acreage, instead of
applying more labor and money in cultivat-
ing the original acreage. As market gar
dener remarked to US a year or two ago: "If
had double my present capital should not
want rod more of land than / have now
1t is far better for profit to decrease the
crops grown outside, in which there is most
competition, and to grow more under glass,
where competition is less, and where articles
thus produced always bring far higher
prices"
The application of this principle to farm
| work ought not to be difficult. In growing
the best Of everything the farmer lifts him
self above the competition that now op-
| presses him. 1t is often said in the profess
| sions that there is room at the top, and this
rule nolds good in farming as it does in
| nearly every employment. Instead of get
ting out Of farming, condemuing the bust
ness as unnecessarily Improbable, more
just conclusion would be that the best
| farming. like the best of everything else.
must always pay, and the effort should
then be to learn how this best may be at
| tanned.