The daily Gate City. [volume] (Keokuk, Iowa) 1855-1916, 1910-03-31
iowa FARMS
ARE GOLD Mines
Holden Seed Corn Special Over the
Rock Island Road Has Been
Doing Some Splendid
Missionary Work
OFFERS ENCOURAGEMENT
State Average on Corn Should be a.
Least SIS Bushels Per Acre
Instead of Only 3s
Bushels.
Especial to The Gate City.1

WALNUT, Iowa, March 31.-A farm
err who attended the lecture of the
Ames experts here expressed the sit
uation in few words when he re,
marked: It's d--n shame that
us Iowa farmers have to be paid and
bribed to make greater profits for
ourselves. The remark is along the
line of that made by southern Iowa
farmer who attended a recent short
course and who remarked: The trou-
BILE with us farmers is that we ara
farmers from the chin down and vacu-
ums from the chin up"
| A week on the Holden seed corn
/ special train run by the Rock Island
railroad is enough to convince any
person that Iowa farmers have never
realized their possibilities befors.
Iowa farms are gold mines, put they
| have simply been scratched, not
plowed deep or worked hard, hereto
fore
Great as are our possibilities, we
have come nowhere near realizing the
best that lies in the land,' declared
Prof. A. H. Snyder, the Ames soil ex-
pert, who is accompanying the Rock
Island train this week. For a long
time little or no attention was paid
to rotation of crops and then slowly
4 the farmers learned that it does not
pay to plant ground continuously to
corn, but that it should be gwen
rest every few years and devoted to
clover or some legume Then we took
to using fertilizers and the movement
to feed homegrown corn to livestock
and return to the soil the elements of
fertility Of which it had been robbed
In growing the corn made Roadway
And now we are teaching the farmers
that before even the ground is plowed
o. narrowed the seed must be tested
and Nature must be given fair
chance to do her work Iowa farmers
are making progress, but it is SLOW"
1t is fact, however, that seed
corn testing is being carried on far
more generally than has been be-
ilieyed. One farmer at Massena few
days ago stated that he had heard OF
the seed corn agitation and had decid-
ed to test his corn in advance OF the
arrival Of the Holden special He did
SO and found fully half of the cars he
had picked out were worthless. He
promptly threw away the poor ears
and then took samples of those he
had tested perfect to the experts Of
the Holden train, who tested them
and whose judgment correspondent
with his. He has enough seed corn
already tested to plant 210 acres and
is not through with the good work
Scores Of other farmers along the
line Of the Rock Island are doing the
same, The Holden special is not
coming along telling the farmers
something they did not know before,
but it is encouraging them, commend
ing them, giving them a pat on the
back to keep them at the work until
Iowa acres shall yield an average full
~ twice as much as they have been
yielding.
"A yield Of forty bushels to the acre
is simply yield of one nubbin, weigh
ing 12l2 ounces, to the ..ill," pointed
out Professor Bowman at today's
meeting. Three kernels were planted,
but only one Yielded and 1t but a poor
little ear. The other two kernels
sacrificed on the altar OF poor seed
corn There Is not an acre of corn
land along the Rock Island that is
not capable of yielding n half ear
more than it does now. If it did the
state average would be fifty-fve bush
els, instead Of about irtyeight bush
els. This would mean millions of dol.
lars added to our wealth each year
Are the Iowa farmers going to realize
their possibilities? Will the vacuum
of which the good southern Iowa farm
err spoke be filed at last?"
-