The Florida agriculturist., 1907-09-25
The Future of Farming.

many farms which we're old when this
country was discovered and are still
producing good crops. We must inn
prove Our methods, or fall behind in
the race, more over the population Of
the world is rapidly increasing and
must be provided for. An editorial,
in the American Farmer contains
prophecy of what future farming will
be, it is as follows:
Fifty years from now Our most ad-
vanced farming methods will be con-
sidered crude and our most scientific
farmers slipshod. A hundred years
from now our population will be so
enormous, running up into the hum
dreds of millions, that it will be a
great problem to feed them It can
not be done by the system of agricul-
ture now prevailing. Only by an i'm
anenSe Improvement all along the line
will it be possible to provide food for
say 5oo,ooo,ooo human beings. 1t will
be necessary to cultivate every farm
as gardens are now cultivated. The
corn belt was thought to have done
remarkably we'll last year and gives
almost equal promise at present, but
1t will almost have to double it's pro-
ductlvlty to meet the demands of the
twenty-first century. Fields which
now excite pride with an average OF
seventy-five bushels to the acre will
have to show hundred or hundred
and twenty-five to be regarded at
their best. This can only be accom-
plished by. scientific agriculture of the
highest order-improvem in the
soil and its preparation, more skill in
selecting seed, better methods of
planting and cultivation. There will
be no weeds in the twenty-frst CEN
tury cornfeld, no room for them, no
SuStenance to spare for their support.
The corn-seed bed will resemble that
now prepared for lettuce or onions.
Every foot, every inch, will have to
count and at its best. We already
see something of this in France and
other advanced countries with crowd
ing populations, but we are still far
from it here, being comparatively raw
and wild. The wheat fields fifty and
hundred years later must not be con-
tent with beggarly average of six
teen bushels to the acre, or even
twenty-five or thirty. They will have
to show up in the forties if the hum
dreds of millions of that day are to
eat wheat bread
Old Nautilus frightened the world
over hundred years ago by his
alarmlst articles going to prove that
the population would soon pass the
means Of subsistence There was no
danger of this then and there will be
no danger of it for a long time to
come, but there are reasons why the
problem will intensity as the decades
roll by. For thousands of years the
population Of the world remained
practically stationary owing to con-
t1nuous wars due to savagery and con-
stantly recurring plaques and pesti
lences due to ignorance. Civilization
will eventually Danish wars and the
advance OF sanitary science will make
pestilences and all kinds Of conta-
glous diseases impossible There will
be no more scourges of smallpox,
cholera, scarlet fever, yellow fever,
or wlde-spreading plaques Thus the
population of the world will be en-
abled to increase and decrease nor
mally with the result that instead of
the sixteen hundred million now es-
t1mated, there will be many billions
and the feeding of these will be the
gigantic task of scientific agriculture.
Try to think of the United States
when it has billion of people within
It's borders. Texas alone will have to
support FULLY hundred million, but
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