The ranch. [volume] (Seattle, Wash.) 1902-1914, 1908-05-01
WHEN TEN ACRES is ENOUGH.


We are often asked whether farm
er can make a living on ten-acre
farm under irrigation. Many farmers
are so accustomed a quarter sections
that they can not realize how it is pos
sible to get along with such small
lot as ten acres Their idea is that
one may with good luck make money
off ranch of eighty or 100 acres, but
that ten acres cannot be made to pro
duce even a living. Now | do not pro
pose to go into any imaginary calcu
lations of how a man can raise $l,OOC
an acre off asparagus or $500 OH
peaches or 81 head from 1000 head
of poultry have done too much prac
tical farming myself to be misled by
any such blooming nonsense. | shall
base my calculations upon very con
sentative estimates and upon method
of farming which | believe will ap
peal to the common sense OF every
practical Westerner.
My first point is that the small farm
er should raise everything he needs
to eat except groceries and this ne
can do if he puts in the right kind OF
crops and keeps COWS, hogs and poul
try. One COW is no good on a farm
for every COW has or ought to have
dry season. Two cows, therefore
should be kept and they will not only
provide food for the family, but there
will be surplus butter to sell and skim
milk for the pigs. An acre OF alfalfa
we'll cultivated and attended to will
produce four tons of hay during the
year which will give daily ration OF
twenty-five pounds. Three acres with
the assistance of other crops will later
on keep two COWS and horse and
one horse will do all the work on a
ten-acre place.
If the alfalfa is soiled during the
summer, it will also go much further
than if all is cut for hay and it will be
found in actual practice that three
acres will give all that is needed fol
the COWS and horse and leave gooC
deal over for the hogs. Two more
acres should be set out to orchard
consisting mainly of winter apples
peaches and plums. For the first two
or three years, beans and vegetables
or food for the COWS may be raised be
tween the rows of the young trees
which should be set out not less than
24X21 feet The house and buildings
will occupy half an acre; the vineyard
quarter of an acre and rhubarb and
asparagus beds an eighth of an acre
each. This, with the house, makes ur
six acres in permanent crops.
The remaining four acres should be
divided into two equal parts anC
farmed in the following rotation: One
year one acre should be heavily ma
nured and laid out as vegetable
garden another should be moderately
MANFRED and planted to potatoes
which with intense cultivation will
yield a sure return Of 5000 and il care
is taken in preserving them there will
never be any difficulty in selling them
during the winter. The acre in vege
| tables will not only provide sufficient
| for family use, but there will be con
siderable surplus that may either be
| sold or fed to the COWS and hogs.
The following year these same two
acres should be seeded to winter
wheat, followed the same summer by
| turnips or rape for the stock. After
vegetable crop there should be NJ
difficulty, If the wheat is sOwed IL
drills and horse-hoed, in raising forty
bushels to the acre have raised sixty
four bushels on land that had beer
under the following rotation: FRS
year, cabbage, MANFRED with sixty tons
of barnyard manure to the acre; sec
ond year. potatoes, with no manure
third year, sixty-four bushels of whea
| with no manure. This was on {
| twelve-acre field and no garden plot
| Two acres of wheat will provide fioul
| for The 70 nnilN and hran for the COWS