The progressive farmer and the cotton plant., 1905-01-03
WHY THE SOUTHERN FARMER NEEDS MORE
I STOCK.
1.-THE Profits in Stock Raising Considered.

phase of this question. Can we make live stock
husbandry successful? That we can produce the
forage necessary to feed three or four times the
live stock we now keep seems quite certain, but
shall we ever learn to feed and care for live stock
in such a way as to make it profitable
We may as well admit we are not stockmen;
we know nothing about the subject, because our
system of farming has been an entirely different
one. We know how to grow cotton or tobacco as
we'll as any other people, and if we turned our
attention to stock-raising In real earnest we would
do that successfully also, but as yet, we have ut
terly failed to grasp the true live stock idea. The
purpose of live stock is not production, but mere
ly to furnish a convenient market for all the food
stuffs that can be grown on the farm and at the
same time return to us the fertilizer necessary
for the growing of future crops.
In the past, failures have been more common
than successes, but 1 believe these failures are but
the logical and certain results of lack of knowl-
edge. Any kind of farming, to be successful,
requires intelligence, personal care and education,
but live stock husbandry is the most e~xacting in
these respects. Yet we have never made a study
of this phase of farming. We have never taken
the business seriously and looked upon it as en-
titled to first consideration in our farming opera
tions. Until we have devoted study, time and
money to the growing of forage crops and mas
tered the complex problems involved in the sci
cnce and practice of feeding, until we have
studied the laws and principles of breeding, be-
come better judges of live stock and learned the
breeds and types adapted to the different purposes
for which live stock is produced, and until we
come to look upon animal husbandry as an i'm
portant part of our farming, out of which money
is to be made, it is not all all likely we shall be
successful growers of live stock.
In short. let me emphasize the necessity of
learning the business before putting all our
money or labor into it. l would not have any
person infer that I think the profits likely to
come easy or in large measure. We should not
expect a large profit on the growing of the feeds
and another on the stock. At the high prices for
which forage crops may be sold in this State at
the present time, we should be well satisfied with
the profits on their production and accept merely
the manure for our trouble in caring for the
stock.
would most earnestly advise against any man
disseminating the growing of cotton or tobacco
and placing his whole dependence on live stock;
nor do I think it would be wise to even materially
reduce his production of these crops, with the
cultivation of which he is familiar, until he has
learned something of live stock husbandry by &C
tuaI experience. Fortunately, such is not neces-
sary, for on every farm a great deal more food
for stock might be produced at a cost fully re
paid by the resulting improvement of the SOIL
without in the least lessening the production OF
what we regard as money" crops.
The live stock which is to-day supplying the
worlds needs is raised by the small farmer. by
comparison, the rancher or large farmer supplies
a very small part of it. That is the condition L
would like to see developed in North Carolina: a