Pullman herald. [volume] (Pullman, W.T. [Wash.]) 1888-1989, 1906-03-24
SATURDAY, MARCH "a, 1906
THE ROTATION
OF PALOUSE CROPS
Essay Written as Part of Glass
Work in Agriculture, Wash.
State College

Probably one of the most important
problems to be considered for the fu-
ture of the Palouse country is that of
crop rotation. There are a number
of factors, however, which cause the
farmers not to look very seriously into
this question. First among these is,
that he has raised wheat so long that
he does not know how to raise another
crop we'll enough to try it. Very few
crops, other than wheat, have been
extensively tried in this section and the
farmer does not think that there is
any other crop that can be proftably
raised. Again great many farmers
think that there is no danger of the
fertility of the Palouse soil giving
out.
That the fertility of the soil will be
depleted by continuous cropping with
wheat is easily seen by looking at the
history of every section where it has
been tried. The great Red River val
ley, once the great wheat growing CEN
ter of North America, now grows but
seven to ten bushels per acre. The
wheat fields of California, few years
ago among the most fertile in the
United States, are rapidly decreasing
in yield. In the Willamette valley of
Oregon dairying and other systems of
farming are taking the place of the
wheat farming because the fertility of
the soil has been so reduced that wheat
raising no longer returns satisfactory
profits.
These are enough examples to show
what results the present system will
produce. 1t remains, therefore,
only to see if system of rotation will
give better results. A system of crop
rotation is one in which the crops
grown are made to succeed each other
in certain fixed order. 1t may be a
three, four, five or six year rotation
according to the number of years it
takes to complete the series and re-
turn to the starting point.
One of the first things to be gained
by a crop rotation would be to stop
the present system of summer fallow-
ing. In summer following there is
not only loss of time by the land
standing idle, but there is an appre-
ciable loss of plant food. This is es-
pecially true of the nitrogen, the saw
ing of which is very important. The
only conditions under which summer
following would be profitable would be
where it requires the rainfall of two
seasons to grow one crop. This how
ever, is not necessary in the Palouse
country. Many claim that summer
following is necessary to keep down
the weeds, but this can be more
effectively done by two means in a
crop rotation. The first of these is
to plant some crop, e. G. hay crop,
which can be harvested before the
weeds are ripe and thus destroy them
before the seeds can mature and be
scattered. Another and probably the
better method is to plant some crop,
as corn or potatoes, which requires
thorough cultivation.
Another thing to be considered is
the size and depth of the root system
and different food requirements for
different plants. Deep rooted crops
should be grown from time to time be-
cause they feed in the soil which is not
used by the other crops and tend to
draw the plant food from deep in the
ground nearer to the surface. The
different food requirements of the
crops should also be studied and care