The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1904-01-05
THE NEED OF MORE LIVE STOCK IN NORTH
CAROLINA.

ONO NN oNONN
farming, if not the greatest need, is more and
better live stock. There can be no successful
agriculture here or elsewhere without a considera-
ton of these three propositions:
/. A soil rich in single, simple chemical ele-
ments for the free growth of plant life.
2. An adoption of plant life to climatic and
soil environments, so as to produce from the ele-
ments in the soil the largest growth of plant life
for animal food.
3. The feeding of animal life to produce great
est growth with least expenditure of plant It's
The farmer to make agriculture rcnumerative
must adapt himself to these propositions. He
must enrich his soil. And here we find the funda-
mental basis. We have heard a great deal about
worn-out lands and exhausted soils. Practically
speaking, we are confronted with vast areas of
this kind of land; vet, in fact, we have no cX-
hausted soils. We have only soils lacking III
productivity because Of the physical and mo
chanical condition of these soils. To illustrate:
In New England we have vast areas, as we have
in the South, Of farms that yield no profitable
crops. You find those soils dead, depleted, life
less. But they are not WORKOUT. they are not
exhausted. In New Hampshire, the writer, by
tillagc, crop rotation and fertilization, increased
hay lands from less than a half ton per acre TO
three tons and over in three years time. Let
us look at these so-callcd soils of the South. You
say they no longer produce paying crops. And
they will not if they are abused. They hold with
in their surface large quantities of plant food.
Let us once turn the pillow share loose in these
soils. and carefully and thoroughly till and cult
waite, and get organic matter back in them by
growing cowpeas and clover, and they will change
from their unprOductive condition into the kind
that Will produce renumerative crops.
| mention this matter of soil improvement be
cause it is the very basis of animal husbandry.
With a poor soil, we have poor crops or poor
plant growth. which means poor cattle. hogs and
sheep.
We can start in live stock husbandry, however.
with the soil condition as it is. Manure and
crop production t" furnish proper feed will
quickly build up the soil. Soil Improvement AMI
~tock-raising go hand in hand. Let us see:
l. We need clover and cowpcas to build up the
soil. But those are the very crops we want for
cattle, sheep and swine. Grow these crops then,
improve the soil and thereby get plants rich in
feeding constituents.
;. We need natural manurcs and fertilizers for
improving the soil. The more cattle and sheep
and swine we have, the more we have of manurcs.
The commercial fertilizer bill is our greatest tax.
But it is to a great extent unnecessary, and if
busincss-like agriculture is followed, chemicals
will be needed only to a limited extent. | like
10 purchase fertilizers in form Of feeding stuffs.
Take a dollar and purchase your cottonseed or
cottonseed meal, but instead of applying them
direct to the soil, first feed them to live stock
and get the value of the organized condition of
the elements. The only difference when plant
food or fertilizers and animal food or plants lies
in the fact that the plant takes unorganized
chemical elements and manufactures or builds
them into organized tissue, which is the plant or