The true Democrat. [volume] (Bayou Sara [La.]) 1892-1928, 1898-11-26
PLENTY OF WHEAT AREA
SECRETARY WILSON COMPUTES Pre-
FESSOR CROOKE'S ASSERTIONS.
He Says the Professor Was Excited In
Talking About This Country and the
Exhaustion of Land For Raising Wheat
Land Used For Other Things.


Exhaustion of Land For Raising Wheat
Land Used For Other Things. @
James E. Wilson. Secretary OF Agrl-
culture, after reading Sir William
Crooke's Presidential address to the
British Association at Bristol upon the
wheat supply Of the world, expressed
with much vigor his dissent from Sir
Williams conclusions.
professor Crooke," said the Sec
rotary, stakes the position that the
possible wheat lands throughout the
whole world have been brought under
cultivation-that there are no more IN
the United States. It is true that the
territory of the United States has been
settled clear to the Pacific coast; but
it is also true that lands originally
sown in wheat and devoted to some
other crops would again produce
wheat abundantly if the price were
high enough. The corn belt in the
Mississippi Valley was devoted by the
original settlers to the raising Of wheat.
to o considerable extent, and con7
tinuous growing of that crop for ten
or twelve years without rotation ex-
hausted the available plant food
Farmers then turned their attention
to stock raising, growing crops to 1eed
their animals, rotating grains and
grass. These grass lands will yield
wheat as abundantly as ever; but 1t IS
grown now so abundantly that farmers
do not get good prices for it.
"Wheat is an unusual grain" con-
tinued the Secretary. cit can be
grown where corn cannot; it can be
grown where grasses cannot. Wheat
IS the highest priced cereal, the favorife
food in Latin countries. 1t is always
a cash Particle. New settlers in new
countries reached by new railroads
are generally men of small means, and
thew first produce wheat in their new
locations, because it is a cash article.
One of the States in the Middle West
now producing little or no wheat could
, in a system of rotation produce very
large CROP of wheat, and would do sc
were the price high enough to Justify
the effort. Wheat is not grown be
/ cause it does not pay. To illustrate
!, was director of the Iowa Agriculture
d Experiment Station for six years. W
i found that one specimen of RUSSIA
n wheat would produce in that locallt
t. forty bushels to the acre.
l. "Within the past few years throug
% the agency of agricultural e1perlme11
ID stations, we have been able to aseertal
is the value of wheat as foodstuff for an
y mails, We know that sixty pounds
to average wheat will make thlrtee
a. pounds of live hog, and it is exte'
he asively fed when the price drops dow
he low. Wheat is the most nutritious ,
be all grains. It's nutritiye value IS q
of termined by the ratio existing betWe'
the bulk of heterogeneous and carbo
aceous matter in the cereal. VINE
r." has one part of digestible nitroseno
q to g. of carbonaceous; oats, l to
or, rye 1 to u; barley, to s; corn l
use 10; rice, / to Is; peas and BEANS
in 2 or3. Nothing comes nearer TO
has ing complete ration for a human
,er- inc than the army bareback furnish
ed. to our soldiers, unless it be milk,
de- YOU can't always get that.
rev "When you civilize man he wa
ers, wheat and beefsteak. The nitrogen'
avail element in food is sought by all elias
the and nationalities ofpeople. 10 bal
sent notatoes man adds buttermllk.
d to New Highlander is partial to pork I
low beans. the one balances the ott
Off Oatmeal and skim milk make pro
also combination. The Chinaman, VIII
can reported to live on rice, grows De
G. 8. to eat with it; the japanese ada hsi
"But that is getting away from
ston. noint at issue, which is that
tates worlds wheat lands, or, at least
ssas- far as we are concerned, those OF
GAO Tinted States are all under cult
just lion Sir William is unduly excl
'uhIT and MS 6mOGloh 40 O
% at appreciation, if not knowledge
e, in the resources of our country. he
serv- vccates increased electrical aSlt'
pro- of the atmosphere as the only me q,
m he of precipitating the nitrates in tn
~, natar and thus replenishing the produ
%, c' his powers of the earth. 1t is much
3 80 - tor Il seems to me, to plant clover
which other legumes, which produce,
: nitrates much faster than cleo
,oa No disturbances. 1t puts them '
:;tb ~ thew are wanted, too, while an en-
'l'n - cal AGITATION might visit itself Il
g Ell. Iap a and destruction upon ? N,
num- num- neishbor's property, where 1t cG ~
l nolse no possibility do any good IN
o edge event" .u..s;
III anu 0ecrebaTy HnoOn
,ttered to the Genesee Valley, which, he
j been illustrated his contention.
know The first great wheat growing
,arried country was done there, but tn
!, abont nile now feed live stock on the
"s;,,,o growing in the old wheat fields
Lo oh buv their -four at Minneapolis
10 os. uD ting it for less money than it