Dakota farmers' leader. (Canton, S.D.) 1890-19??, 1908-06-12
$1.5O PER ANNUM.
Is There A PeriOdicity In Poor
Corn Crops?

One Of our advertising men recently
called upon a stock breeder who said
he was not ready to place his adver-
t:SGinent because he was morally GER
tain that we would have short corn
crop this year. He said that we had
a short corn crop in 1901 short crop
seven years before, and he might have
said with approximate truth that we
had another short crop seven years
before that. We find that this farmer
is not alone in his opinion; for some
of the papers and magazines that are
always wise in the matter of corn
crops have been anticipating a short
age this year, because this is the sew
enth year, a sort of sabbatical corn
year, in which they allege that in the
light of past experience we can not
expect full crop of corn.
With view to determining how
much there is in this theory we have
referred to the Year Book of the De-
partment of Agriculture for 1906,
which gives the average production of
corn in all the states for forty-one
years, from 1866 to 1906, inclusive.
The average the United States over
for 1901 was 1877 bushels, for 1894 1914
bushels, for 1887 pol bushels. The
man who is disposed to draw sweep
ing conclusions from narrow basis
of facts might say that If since 1880
we have had the shortest corn crop
every seventh year, we may certainly
expect to have short crop in 1908.
If, however, there Is sort of sabbath
cal law governing the corn crop, by
which every seventh year we are to
haye short crop, just as the children
of Israel of old were not allowed to
cultivate their lands on the seventh
year, or, in other words, If our corn
lands take Sabbath rest whether
we want them to or not, the same
rule should hold good as far back as
our statistics go, in fact, to the be-
ginning Of corn cultivation.
Let us look into this. In 1880 the
average crop was 27.6 bushels, in 1873
23.S bushels, and in 1866 25.3 bushels,
or an average of 25.6 bushels in these
three sabbatical years, compared with
an average of 1877 bushels for the last
three sabbatical years Evidently this
sabbatical law, on the strength of
which we are to expect short crop
this year is but of recent introd uction,
and hence it is a mere accident that
we have had a, short crop every sew
enth year in the period first mem
toned.
The average yield of these forty-one
years has been 25.4 bushels per acre;
and man might as we'll argue that
because our average crops in the five
years ending with 1905 have been 27.e
bushels per acre, % bushels per acre
over the average for forty-one years
that this is all due to the gospel o.
corn that has been preached so ener
getically during these years. VIZ
have no doubt that part of it is du,
to this, but the falling off from 30:
bushels in 1906 to 25.9 bushels in 190.
should teach us that there are Other
factors quite beyond human cOntrO
that enter largely into the yield O
corn in any one year.
Therefore our advice is to go aheaG
and grow all the corn you can, grow
all the stock you can, take as good
care Of them as you can, and sell them
at as high price as you can, taking
no stock in the weather prophets or
the corn prophets or any other kind OF
prophets. Prophecy in the sense of fore
telling the future has been lost art
for nearly 1900 years at least. 1t is
the preaching Of the gospel of good
farming that is needed now rather
than prophecy of what the crop will
be. There is but one thing certain
about the weather, which is such a
large factor in the production of crops
and that is that it is uncertain. We
must take what the Lord gives and
make the best we can out of it.-Wal-
laces' Farmer.