The silver messenger. (Challis, Idaho) 1890-1912, 1911-05-23
DRY FARMING ISSUE
Movement Has Direct Value IN
Application to East.
Mover Have Good Agriculture Ont''
Farmer Prepares for Dry Times
Just az Consciously as He Does
for the Winter.

for the Winter.
am convinced that the dry farm
ing movement has direct value III l's
application to eastern as well as west
ern conditions. The movement Is
necessary, and therefore worth whlle,
In r>-~estern applications alone, ana
in It's bearing on the welfare OF those
regions 1t should appeal to all the peo-
pie; but 1t also has bearing on agrl-
culture in the entire country such as
our people do not yet understand.
We habitually associate dry farm
ing" with dry regions; but the conser-
walton of water lies also at the 1ounoa-
ton Of agriculture in most humid re-
gions. as we'll as in semi-arid regions,
for the crop .1snumid regions Is very
generally determined by the pinch OF
the dry SPELL or drought, writes l..
H. Bailey. director of the New YORK
State College of Agriculture at Cornell
university, in the Dry Farming Con-
gress Bulletin. AS the strength OF q
wall is measured by its weakest
course, SO is the producing power
Of the year determined, under prevail
ing farming methods, by the poorest
or least effective growing month.
Farmers in the semi-arid regions
are compelled to save the rainfall, and
they prepare a definite program OF
conservation, making this program
part Of their reckoning. But the
farmer In humid regions usually
makes little or no allowance OF
reckoning for drought, and when Il
comes he is caught; and yet the
drought and not the rainfall deter
mines his crops.
We shall never have good agricul
ture until the farmer prepares for dr..
times and drought just as consciousl.
as he prepares for winter. The "dr.
spell' of summer is usually consid
cred to be a calamity; it is probable
that properly regulated system o
husbandry would make such spells t.
be advantageous.
The annual precipitation at Ithaca
In central New York, is approximate
SO inches; yet there is record of
year with a rainfall Of only PIP
inches. The average recorded yearl
rainfall for the state of New Yor
ranges from 81 inches down to 20 l.
inches, and If we exclude Long Islam
with its more uniform precipitation
the minimum becomes about 261
inches, or approaching closely to dr.
farming conditions. There are part
of the state in which the mean pr,
cipitation over a series of years
under 20 inches.
l have before me the records for 4
years of one station in western Ne
York, with an annual average of 275
inches, in which there are four year
with total precipitation Of less tina
20 inches Zone year only 1914 inches
and two years with total Of 20.02 an
POSI-. Were 1t not for other aids tina
rainfall of the particular year (thel
Is probably low evaporation due I
proximity Of large bodies of waite
and water Is held in the soil fro
other years), this would be a sem
arid place; for a region is usual
held to be semi-arid If its precipit
ton is less than 20 inches.
1t is the precipitation of the gro
Ing months" however, that largely d
termines the crop. In the dry sectit
just mentioned, there are 26 years
the 48 in which the monthly rainfs
was less than one and one-half inch
(Which is very dry in one or more
the months of May, June, July, A
gust; and there are ten other years
which the rainfall in one or more
these months was between two inch
and one and one-half inches (whi
usually indicates droughty conditions
Even at Ithaca, with its mean preci]
tation of about 33 inches land a ma.
mum of about 1919, there are
years out of So in which the rainf,
was less than one and one-half inch
In one or more of these four growi
months, and IA other years in which
was less than two inches, making
years in the So Cor about three-fift
Of the years) in which droughty &C
ditions prevailed. Even in a secti
In western New York with a mean {
nual precipitation of 441a inches and
maximum Of SOY, there were fl
years out of 20 in which the rainf
was less than two inches in one
more Of the four growing months.
, to these four main growing mont
were added April and September,
the foregoing figures OF droughty CT
ditions would be more marked.