St. Tammany farmer., 1901-05-04

FARMER RANDPLANTER


FARMER ANDPLANTER.
INCREASING FERTILITY.
The Farners who Have Been Ruth.
lessly DesDoiling the Soil Must
Give sonething Back.
Take nothing from nothing and
nothing remains. Now, take some
thing from nothing, and if it were .
possibility, you would have still less.
For the past so TO 100 years the
farmers of this country have been
ruthlessly despoiling the soil of its
virgin freshness until its fertility is
exhausted. its productive capacity )
lessened or totally destroyed. and yet
the remedy for this condition OF
things proposed isEwhat? To simply
sow the land down to clover or cow
peas, as if clover or cow peas could
remedy the wrong that has been per-
petrated for 50 or 100 years Of TAX
ing everything possible of the land
and never putting anything back.
Clover furnishes what? Nitrogen.
Cow peas furnish what? Nitrogen.
Where is phosphoric acid and potash
that has been removed in so to 100
years of continued cultivation to come
from? How is it to be restored? Can
it, like nitrogen, be gotten from the
atmosphere? Not at all. If restored
at all, it must be restored by artiti-
cial means-by the hand of man. As
phosphoric acid and potash are just
as important and just as inevitably
good and profitable in the making Of
good and profitable crop as is MI
trogen, where is the business sense,
the business acumen, the good judg-
ment in depending upon something
that furnishes nitrogen alone? We
leave it with our clover-stricken or
pea-stricken friends to decide.
For several years past we have been
running an experimental farm OF our
own. We have been running it for
what actual practical information.
az well as profit, we could get out Of
it. Among other things we have
learned by so doing is, that one-sid-
ed fertilization don't pay. In order
to raise maximum crops year after
year, and still. IS is the object Of
every good farmer, to leave the land
better than he found it; or, in other
words, to increase instead of decreas-
ing the fertility and sonsequent pro-
ductive capacity of the soil, it is absO-
lutely essential: First. that more In
stead of less is annually added to the
soil than is taken from it; and. seq
ond, that due proportion" q prop
er "balance," or as nearly as posi-
ble and practicable in the way of per-
feet equilibrium of the three leading
elements Of fertility, to-wit-nitrO-
gen, pnos?horic acid and potash be
maintained. Thin, and nothing short
Of this, will bring about maximum
or profitable crops year by yea. Nj
trogen by itself is not complete fer:
tilizer. and never will be. Phosphoric
acid by itself il not complete fer
tilizer, and never will be. Potash it
self, although truly remarkable re-
suits have been obtained by its use
alone is not q complete fertilizer. and
never will be. No, but by judicious
Of these three leading
elements, and by their liberal tnot
prodigaD use, five bales of cotton
have been made to the acre; 225 BUSH
els of corn have been made to the
acre; 500 pushels of sweet potatoes
and upwards of 1000 bushels of Irish
potatoes have been made to the acre;
600 gallons of sirup; six tons of hay
and 65 bushels Of wheat have been
made to the acre. What has been done
can be done again. How? Is it by TAX
ing everything of the land, or il il
by adding something to the land? {?
There are no halfway measures in
this case. 1t is that which il taken
from the land that makes it poorer,
and conversely. 1t is that which is
added to Land that makes it richer.
Every farmer can readily call to mind
instances where poor acres have been
enriched, but with the single excep-
ton of the means of enrichment be-
ing purchased, in the shape of cattle
feeds, manure or chemical fertilizers,
hence, brought it from abroad the
OF those same acres was
brought about by the impoverishmens
of other less-favored acres. 1t j sim
ply a borrowing from Peter to pay
Paul" The planting Of leguminous
crops is the very esSence fgood farm
ing. BY means of them every farmer
can raise his own needed supply of
nitrogen and keep up his supply of
humus. but here rs agents to be used
in the maintenance or increase of
fertility, their usefulness ends. They
do not, and can not, supply the pot
ash and phosphoric acid that arc
equally essential and equally indis-
pensable with the much-vaunted ni-
trogen in the production of profitable
crops. A wellsbalanced fertility can
not be brought about by leguminous
crops alone. A judicious rotation of
crops il also absolutely indispensa-
BILE to good farming; but, like the
sowing of the legumes, too much
should not be expected of it. As
means to aid in maintaining fertility
it easily takes front rank, but there
is nothing about rotation that would
tend to actually increase fertility
with the single exception of raising
our own supply of nitrogen and main
our supply of humus.
The fertility Of the soil is very much
like ones bank account. HWhen
the Withdrawals are continuous and
any deposits, it becomes Eim-
ply q matter of time when our checks
will return to US dishonored. On the
other hand, when the deposits exceed
the Withdrawals, said bank account il
growing larger.-C. L.
Turner, in Texas Farm and Ranch.
HOW TO SELECT SEED CORN.
A Matter for Careful ConsidePatlon