Norwich bulletin., 1913-06-07
UNCLE IKE's APHoRIsM WAS ALL RIGHT
Most big crops are raised before they're planted. .'-Uncle Ike.

Most big crops are raised before they're planted. Uncle Ike.
 Sounds absurb2 Seems much like putting the, cart before the horse?
 Not a bit of it. Uncle Ike was no book farmer. In truth, think he felt considerable contempt for book farm CTS. He was a horny-handed, shag- Ey-haired old veteran of the plowed lands. He held his own blow and drove his own harrow. But he was a man of really remarkable mind. I M@Ear knew a keener observer or a man with equal memory. He was able to put two and two together and make four, every time. He hadn't when young, the chances which the young farmers now have. But he made bet ter use of those at his hand than many of us do, now days. He and I didn't always agree. Whentwe didn't the likelihood was that I was wrong, if only my head hadn't been too thick to see it.
 Uncle Ike's little apho~ism was meant just to put terse form his opinion about tillage. He tbelieved in manure and used all he could get He didn't have much faith in commercial fertilizers, except as stimulants and temporary helps. Wherein I find that a great many farmers, who once in- vested heavily in them, are coming to agree with him.
 But he believed in cultivation: such cultivation as wasn't common in his younger days, and isn't common enough, now.
 Once his hired man who was in- clined to think the old farmer a lit tie cranky about his narrowing ideas, came from a certain field, one warm day, and said:
 ''Wa'n, Uncle, I've harrered that north and and Sf and west, and cross-ways and corner-ways. S'pose it'll do?"
 The old man turned. a pair of twinkling eyes to his helper. Then he made a rapid mental calculation of about how long the work had taken, and 8 glance at the wesuering sun told him how much of the day was still left
 "Barden," he said, slowly, you've left out the most important part You go back and harrer that field once more sou'west by sou. Nd then go all around the fences about twice more,-in half-lay," he added sharp ly, as the disgusted hired man turn ed the team back towards the future corn patch.
 Perhaps you have a prejudice against intensive farming I know a good many farmers who sneer when ever they hear the term used. We'll, - Call it anything you like. Call it thorough tiI1age," if you prefer. That doesn't mean exactly the same as in- tenstve farming, but it means some quarrel with tillage. And, if you be- Heve in tillage you can't well help believing in through tilBage. For any thing that is worth doing at ali is worth doing thoroughly
 IF Nosrgrn 1. fair ,,,an fo i,. 1,,;tL 1-o,,, self, I mean (too many of us are not) 7, you can't help seeing that the better your ground is. fitted, the bet ter the crops, as a uSual thing. "Plow- deep while sluggards sleep" said Poor Richard. The finer the tilth the finer the crop" said old Jethro Tull a pioneer English farmer. Campbell the famous arid-land farmer went so far as to put his wheat and hay in rows, not just drills, so he could cul- tivate it.
 We sometimes sheer at the Jap anese and Chinese. But the little farmers of China and Japan raise from five to ten times bigger crops than we do. acre for acre They do it chiefly through better tillage Right down at the bottor of things, that is the main motive which inspires the movement in California to forbid them owner ship of land. Farmers who have inn AIiSIdlcu 1TO1I EuSEduU anu 1ToIanQ and Norway and Germany and Italy and who therefore call themselves Americans" haven't the patience nor the skill to till as the little yellow fel- lows do. Consequently the yellow lads raise bigger crops at lesser cost, per bushell or per bag, and thus endang- CT the market of the Americans"
 Of course, this isn't all there is to 1t but it is this which started the row. 1
 One difference between farming and gardening is that in farming, one raises crops which pay if he has reasonably good luck,-a hundred or two hundred dollars profit, per acre. The reason? It is two-fold. For one thing, the gardener raises crops which he finds the markets offer high prices for For another thing, the gardener tills. He tills in season and out of season. He tills deep and he tills close. He puts the work on one acre which the big farmer puts on five. And he gets results accordingly.