The Palatka news and advertiser. [volume] (Palatka, Fla.) 1902-1905, 1904-02-12
The Farm and Grove.
CONSIDER CAssAvA.


regular staple spring crops, cassava
should not be lost sight of. The es-
tablished value of the crop for feed
ing purposes make its planting on
every farm a matter of prime i'm
portance. With four factories stand
ing ready to consume larger quantl-
ties of cassave than they have ever
vet been able to secure, and at least
two of them anxious to make con-
tracs with planters, for their crops,
at remunerative prices for the crops
before they are planted, it would
seem that the advantages of cassava
as a staple crop should be readily
recognized.
A few comparisons as to yields,
cost and profits will assist practical
farmers to understand the relative
values of the different crops. Cas-
sava is perfectly adapted to the aver
age high pine lands on which corn
and lOng-staple cotton are standby
crops. On these lands the average
yield of corn is not over ten bushels
per acre, worth today, $3.50. The
yield of cotton may fairly be placed
at 300 bushels of seed cotton, which
at 5 cents is worth $l5. This same
land will average five tons Of cas-
sava, which you need not feed out,
or take chances on next fall markets,
but sell in advance at So per ton, or
$50 per acre.
1t is therefore apparent that cas-
sava is, as money crop, worth i'll
gross return twice as much as cot
ton, and more than five times as
much as corn. Aside from the cost
of seed and planting cassava can be
as cheaply made as corn. This adj
ditional cost can not exceed s.. Corn
can not be produced for less than s..
These two items together make the
cassaYa cost $40 per acre. | know
many farmers, who, from their own
experience, affirm that they would
rs soon make Il crop OF cassaVa as OF
corn, that the cost is 10 greater. |
have never been able to do this, but
believe it possible. Even granting
that season or other conditions may
increase the cost of working the
crop, and that three to five dollars
more in fertilizer would be Il good
investment, the cost of making a
crop of cassava can not possibly
claim above Sl5, leaving an average
net profit OF $l5 per acre on the most
conservative possible estimate.
Every thoughtful cotton grower
knows that his cotton costs him at
least $40 to make, so that even
at present high prices he has L
margin of profit Of only 50 per acr,
which may easily be entirely wiped
out by the spectators who control
his market before the crop can be
made and sold. In this event he can
neither eat it nor drink it, and his
wife can not weave it, nor he sit up
nights to wear it if he could. Cas-
sava, on the other hand, is one of the
most useful food crops known. 1t is
actually worth for food much more
than the price at which it can be
sold, profitable as that is, as COM
pared with other market crops. Cat
tie, horses, hogs, poultry and men
like it and thrive on it, so that the
crop can not possibly fail Of making
profitable return.
A few days ago met Il well known
citizen of Holmes county who grew
and fed cassava in small way for
the first time last year. He became
interested in cassava at farm
rr'S institute held at Bombay. He
planted one-siXth of an acre on land,
which, with the manure and cUltiva-
ton given, would probably have pro-
duced twenty bushels of corn per
acre.
In the fall he put six shoats upon
1oOred pen and fed one and one-half
bushels of corn. Then for forty-two
days they were fed nothing but the
cassava They We're then killed and
dressed 100 pounds each. The meat,
he atiirmS, was as firm. sweet-flav-
ured and kept as we'll as any he ever
Tade with corn. His cora raiions
for fattening such slOats is one
gallon per day, or 81 and 10
bushels for the time fed They act
ually did receive one and one-half
bushels, leaving thirty bush els as
the amount of corn saved by the cas-
sava. The land from which the cas-
|ava fed was harvested was meas
ured and found to be One-eigbth of
an acre. This area produced the
equivalent of thirty bushels of corn,
or at the rate OF 24O bushels in the
form of cassava. In other words the
land which would produce twenty
bushels of corn actually made the
of 24O bushels, i'm feeding
value, when planted to cassava.
On all OF the evidence it would
seem an established fact that he who
plants cassava displays good judg-
ment, and taxes as little risk as is in
volved in the making and disposing
Of any crop, with every probability of
finding far greater profit than is pos
sible with any other staple crop
which may be planted in large guam
titles.
QUESTIONS ANSWERED.