The Birmingham age-herald., 1905-12-30

is alfalfa that has so greatly increased the value of our hay crops Cowpeas
 and sorghum hay have also been great
 factors in bringing around this result After travelling over the great hay pro- l ducng states I am not In the least sur | prised at these figures. They only confirm | what I have said in these papers that grass Is the foundation of agricultural 1 wealth for any and all countries. Take our beef the value of which is $662,- ] GOO. GOO; our dairy products, $625, ,000, GOO,
 added to our hay $eo5, 100000. and we have
 the enormous sum of s1, ,992, ,0,O00 that came almost direct from grasses of our coun- l try. Should we also take into account | what grass has done for poultry, goats l sheep, hogs, mules and horses we would ! have at least two billion dollars of farm products coming directly from grass. i While we crown corn as king of all our
 grains, we should remember to crown grass queen of all farm products. The
 proceeds of our grass leads our cotton
 crop by at least sl, ,4S5, GOO. 900, yet we still ' have farmers In our country who are
 making slaves of their families in trying to destroy $10 or $12 worth of grass on an acre of land In order that they may
 produce from s4 to $S worth of cotton. Let the grass grow, put on sheep, hogs and
 dairy cows to eat 1t and sell 1t in the
 form of mutton, pork or better still turn
 1t Into butter fat and sell cream
 : Dairy Products.
 l The figures on our dairy products tell
 their own story-s625, 00o.000 worth of dairy products. This leads the cotton by S6S, S,000.-
 coo, and yet we are not producing enough
 dairy products to meet our home de-
 mands. All classes of people use dairy
 products in some form in almost every
 meal they eat. Butter is as much staple as bread, and is in such common use ho,, fr, aoI1 f... for we find it on every table in every l home and the hotels as well. Enormous quantities of Ice cream are now used and the uses of dairy products are too numer-
 ous to mention. Our people are becoming
 more and moro educated each year in tho value of pure dairy products. There is
 nothing on the farm that promises so
 much to the farmers as does good grass pastures and the dairy cows.
 Our dairy products only lead our poul- try by sl25, 00O. GOO. This is not near enough difference between the hen and COW. We should have had at least 1000. coo worth of dairy products to our credit The Cotton Crop.
 We have fallen off from our last years value of the cotton crop. There are sev-
 eral reasons for this. the late bad spring
 weather having given the crop an unfa- vorable start in many sections of the country. Had the crop all over the coun- i try produced as 1t has in western Okla homa and northern Texas, we would have far exceeded in value the crop of last year. In the two sections named, farm- CTS have more cotton than they can get gathered. At the time of this writing from Hobart. Slahoma, December 1S there are hundreds of bales of cotton yet in the fields of these two sections. Farmers i'll some places are paying SIPS and board per hundred to get this cotton picked, and cannot find help at these prices. In some
 ,.Ia V,.1t. s<.1- cotton, and the experiment has proven
 quite satisfactory. However, the Indians demands his pay at night. Our farmers should grow every pounds of cotton that the markets of the world will take at 10 cents per pound, grow no more and no less, but In growing this cotton do not neglect the old hen. the sheep, hog and tho dairy cows, as well keep in mind the
 growing of all hay and grain needed on the farm
 Poultry.
 The figures on poultry are something wonderful, amounting to S500,000,000. Now this enormous sum comes largely from tho efforts of the women of our country. All the cotton farmers of our country, with all that the women and children have helped them, are only ahead of the women with their poultry by S57000,0 %. Take out the difference of expense in the produc tion of cotton and poultry and the poultry will lead. This is another industry that should be encouraged and pushed. for we are not growing enough poultry to meet our home demands. For several weeks buyers have been securing the country here for poultry, paying 10 cents per pound for live turkeys. A number of cars have
 been secured and shipped 10 Denver, yet the market Is not supplied. Oklahoma and Texas can be made our leading states in the growing of turkeys. The conditions
 here are just right. Our wheat crop only leads our poultry by $25.000.000.
 Hogs and Sheep.
 The figures on hogs and sheep are more of a surprice to me than anything else
 in this report We are credited with pro- ducing only $2s3, 100000 of sheep and hogs
 combined Here Is food for our farm
 CTS to think about. Our poultry leads
 these industries by $2f7,000,000. There is something wrong somewhere. We should have at least to our credit $25O. 0o0,0o0 in
 sheep alone, and surely our hogs should equal our poultry products and give ns at least $500000, GOO. Now is a good time for farmers to engage in the hog and sheep business. Hogs and dairy cows should go together. the hogs to eat the skim milk mixed with meals made from forage. grain crops grown cheaply and the cream from the cows to be sold
 My article in last weeks issue gave the importance and value of the sheep indus try.
 
 Potatoes, tobacco, sugar and rice have all added their part in this grand total But there are many other products not named in this report-horses, mules goats, our fruit and truck growing in- dustries, honey, broom corn, buck wheat and sorghum, all of which would easily bring the value of our farm products up to the sum of seven billion dollars
 As it is the closing of the most pros porous year in our history, will ask the reader to look back over the year and | see if you have done your part-a1l you | could have done in helping to bring about | this great result. Have you attended the | Farmers institutes you should? have | you gone to these for the information you needed? or have you spent your spare | time idling? No, 1t Is not the farmer | who reads agricultural papers who idles away his time,s but it is the full 1-grown, thoroughly educated farmer who does not feel the need of knowledge more. These are the fellows we are after and we wan. every reader to go after then, and let us see how many of them we can enlist in this busy work for the coming year. There is room for them all and the world needs what they can and should be pro- ducng. So let us go after them. try 10 get them to the Farmers institutes, tryl to persuade them to read agricuituralI papers, try to get them to put in morel time on the farm and produce their share of the great crops needed. If we canI only get all these idlers and half-pro-i lueers to join our ranks for the coningi year. the results at the close of the yeart will astonish the world. What we need to accomplish these good results is bet