The progressive farmer and southern farm gazette. (Starkville, Miss.) 1910-1920, 1910-03-26
Professor Massey's
Editorial Page.
Cotton-Our Greatest Crop.

grown that keeps men poorer Wnen grown In the
old single-crop way than cotton.
These old methods have enriched the fertilizer
manufacturers and have made wastes of thousands
OF acres in the Cotton Belt. They have kept thou
sands OF men in bondage to the merchant and the
Fertilizer seller, year after year taking the old
hopeless task of going in debt to start the cotton
crop. and coming out at the end of the season Of
ten worse of than at the beginning
The all-cotton man will tell you soberly that
there is no money In anything but cotton, while
Hhe fact is. hat in most cases he has not found
great deal In cotton. Yet here and there are
farmers who have found out what there is in cot
ton when they farm instead of merely plant cot
ton. Talking once with large cotton farmer in
South Carolina who generally made more than
bale per acre. he said that he made cotton at q
cost Of four and half cents per pound, and that
the cured bacon saw him selling by the wagon
Toad cost him the same price per pound Cotton
was then six cents q pound. and he still had lit
tie margin, but the bacon and hams averaged him
fourteen cents pound. and the feeding Of the
Nogs left something to help his SOIL
At that time the all-cotton men were In distress,
Tor they could not make cotton at four and half
cents pound after being carried by q merchant
and paying 100 per cent on everything they
bought The other man kept hogs and sheep and
cattle, and made and oats and hay and fed
them. too. and. Of course, he had manure. and
These carried
the merchant He bought for cash all that he
needed to buy. and he did not need to buy much
Tor he did not need to buy fertilizers for his corn
nor complete fertilizer for his cotton. for 1t fol-
lowed after peas and crimson clover. His land
was increasing In fertility and productiveness
while the all-cotton men were asking what fer
Silizer to use for corn. oats. wheat. cotton and
every other crop, and could not think of planting
any OF these helping crops without buying more
&ertilizer for them Realizing what the fertilizer
0or cotton costs them. they can not understand
Shat they need not buy complete fertilizer for
every other crop. and they jump to the conclusion
Shat cotton Is the only crop they can afford to
grow.
What We need to learn Is. that commercial fer
talizers, properly used. are valuable adjunct to
our homemade manures in the permanent up
building Of the soil in humus. but used merely,
year after year. for the production of something
70 sell on the land they the ruin OF the soil and
the farmer alike And the poorest farms and the
poorest farmers in all the Cotton Belt are where
the most money has been spent for commercial
tertilizers with the one idea OF making cotton to
sell.
The Affection man must spend more money be-
cause he has to buy his nitrogen in a fertilizer,
while the good farmer gets his nitrogen Free and
xor the same money gets twice as much of the
pnosphoric acid and potash he has to buy and
these stay by him till used by the crops while the
nitrogen does not.
The hardest thing to get the average cotton
planter to understand is that the use of rotation
oI crops ana the growing Of legume forage will
enable him to reduce his cotton acreage and still
make as much. or more. cotton on one-third the
land than he has been making the whole II
Is the man who takes five acres to make bale of
cotton who is keeping the Southern soil and him
self poor.
but am glad to know that there Is new
spirit abroad in the South, and the day is not far
TINT laa.a Tor .xriII ho