The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1901-10-22
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five bushels of slaked lime per acre on
the green vines when they + a tthei1
best, and immediately pillow them
under so as TO be ready for the cotton
crop in the spring, thus raising the
80 acres of cotton on the two 80 acre
fields alternately year after year
and never two crops of cotton suo-
cessively following each other.
Now 1 firmly believe that any
planter who will handle his 100 acre
experimentation field in this way
will gather more than one bale per
acre from 80 acres on the average an
nually, or likely over the amount
now had from the 16O-acre cotton
field. If the 80 acres noted above be
planted early for fodder corn and
drilled in rows two feet apart, and
after one level working, drill one
row of peas in the middle between
the BORN rows, cutting the same
when both are IN their highest green
state, likely about first of July, and
with green oats, millet or other
grass cutting all into the silo, it will
make a feed that is very hard TO ex-
Gel, if we'll enriched with cotton seed
meal and perhaps some wheat bran
and oorn meal.
After this crop the land should be
sowed in peas or beans and plowed
under just before frost, as recon.
mended above.
One might say that "you have pro-
vided for an outlay of $500 a yearfo
concentrated fertilizers and that is
as much as 1 now spend for 100 acres
of cotton"
Ireply, that is true, but under an
entirely different system of agricul.
ture. You now use most all the net
profits from the cotton field TO pay
for fertilizer, meat and things, while
the cotton field is getting no better
IL not poorer every year. We can
zee that under this new system it Is
shown that in keeping 800 sheep the
net income is annually $400 for nine
a Three hundred dollars per
annum can easily be spared for basic
fertilizers in return for the lint cot.
ton, wool and mutton sold from the
plantation, leaving over 800, a year
from the Sheppard that at mini
mum not maximum prices-besides
over $1,000 a year net profits from
the 80 bales of cotton annually sold
and in addition>to this, the fact that
the 100 acres of cotton land is an
nually becoming richer and more
productive as we'll as in evident i'm
provement of the entire plantation.
Under this system I am much mis-
taken if cotton growers could not
produce cotton at five cents per
pound and clear more money than
they do now under the present sys-
tenn, and thus gore the giant com
bines in their dens and, under the in
vincible law of supply and demand,
be able TO wrest from them their ill
gotten gains. Also, co-extensively
Herewith save to the South the mil
lions of money now being paid by
the Northern wool manufacturers TO
foreign countries for imported wool
and woolens that the people will and
must have.
If sheep husbandry we're generally
engaged in by the planters, it would
vastly increase the entire cotton crop
and produce a clip Of wool worth half
as much as the cotton, and produce
a quantity of the best meat in the
world worth far more than the South
is now paying the North and West
for meat, and besides all this estab-
lish a system of agriculture that
would not only be self sustaining to
the land, but would vastly promote
it's general fertility and productive.
ness.
have a few mor words, and then
I am through in this connection.
1 started out to show that to de-
vote one half the area to sheep hus-
bandry that is now devoted TO grow
ing cotton on scarcely a paying basis,
would not only introduce to the
South a comparatively new industry,
that is in itself most profitable, but
would result in an increased crop of
cotton, mainly from use of sheep nls
nure as a fertilizer under an advanced
and progressive method of prepare
ton and application.
Now if Bhere are any three reliable