The Idaho Republican. [volume] (Blackfoot, Idaho) 1904-1932, 1913-07-25
WHERE POTAToE PROFIT GOES.
Boise Man Tells of Waste in the
Business.


out information as to how potato
raisers must make use of their culls
to add to their income in ordinary
years, and to use up surplus yield
when the supply seems to exceed the
demand.
In Mr.. Feldh sens interview at
this office he dwelt upon the general
principle of making use of all we pro-
duce instead of letting considerable
portion of it go to waste directly, and
losing another large percentage by
handling or using it the wrong way.
For example, the farmer who sells
his crop of any kind outright and has
it shipped out of the country in some
bulky condition, has to sacrifice
much of it in freight and expense of
hauling. The same farmer pays an
other freight bill on something that
he ships back for home consumption,
and it is likely to be something which
he ought to have produced out Of the
thing he shipped out. An example
of this is shipping out alfalfa and
shipping meats back from where the
alfalfa is consumed. Shipping out
oats or corn and shipping back pork
products; shipping wheat out and
shipping -four back; shipping out all
grain and forage plants and shipping
dairy and poultry products back;
shipping hogs to Portland and buying
pork products from Omaha, losing
not only the freight expense both
ways but losing to the other commun-
ity the benefits of the industrial pay
roll and general wealth of the pack
ing houses and manufacturing plants
where these changes are brought
about in the commodity before re-
turning it to us.
In making use of the culls left
from the potato crop, any industry
that contemplates systematic hand
ling of them, contemplates paying
only about 25 cents per hundred
weight or five dollars ton, and far
mers usually decline to bother with
loading and hauling them at that
price; but they haul the sugar beet
at that price, and first work all sum-
mer to produce it. The Gull potato
exists anyhow, and as the expense of
producing them has to be counted in
at best, it just becomes a question
of taking them from the field to the
place of using them.
A good example of the saving made
In converting this waste into profit
that means something more than the
mere price of the article saved is
shown in the statistics of Germany on
potatoes and corn. When Germany
was importing "a million bushels of
corn from the United States and was
losing 100 million bushels of Gull po-
tatoes. Four bushels of potatoes
were equal in feed value to a bushel
of corn, and nearly all the corn they
imported was being fed to stock.
Scientists were induced to find way
to convert the culls into form that
would feed the stock ordinarily given
the American corn, with the result
that since the year 1907 it has been
In process, starting with about 200
factories in 1907 to convert potatoes
into potato flakes, making cmmer-
cial product as easily kept and hand
led as bran. In 1911 they had 400
factories and this year about 600 in
operation. They save the shipping
expense on the potatoes and corn,
and give employment to their own
people operating the factories.
In Idaho we are raising hogs on
rlfalfa, and sending them to corn
states to be finished off, Alfalfa is
rich in matchmaking elements, and
potato flakes are rich in elements
that make fat. Using up our waste
and surplus potatoes making potato
lakes will help to save the freight
bills on the hogs going out and on
pork products coming back.
Potato -four is made from a good
quality of clean potates, and is used
BY good bakers in proportion of one
pound to ten of wheat flour. 1t is said
% improve the quality of the bread,
,ut the potato -four costs ten cents a
pound in Idaho. It is possible to
it in this state and sup
lily rapidly increasing demand ship
ling the concentrated commodity at
he higher price in a box car instead
If the bulky raw product at the lower
1rice, by the expensive refrigerator
,ar. The freight on potatoes from
southern Idaho to Chicago is about
80 cents per hundredweight, and the
,ost of reducing 100 pounds to pota-
q flakes is nine cents In Cprmanv