The Bridgeport evening farmer. [volume] (Bridgeport, Conn.) 1866-1917, 1913-09-18
CORN m NEW ENGLAND
cRx George French.>

(By George French.)
About the hardest thing for a bred
| New Englander is to bring himself to
| a realizing sense that he can possibly
| compete with the gigantic West in
| anything whatever. He looks upon the
| West through the very same eyes the
| Irish immigrants were said to look, in
the old days, upon America. He thinks
| it a region of agricultural prodigieS.
| When he is told that a watermelon
| broke from it's vine on western hill
| side, rolled down and hit a house,
| burst and drowned the whole family
/ in the house, he is half inclined to be-
lieVe IT. He thinks that everything
| that springs from seeds will grow out
| there If the seed is dragged over the
| fields. He seems to believe that when
| the farmers want some corn all they
| have to do is to drive out on the
| prairie and load up the carts. And, on
| the other side. he is skeptical of all
| claims for New England. Try it on
any gathering of New England rural
people Tell them perfectly truthful
accounts of what some of the enter
pr1sing ones have done and look for
the sarcastic grins and the disguised
scowIs.
The run of real New England farm
ers have not yet become reconciled to
the fact that they can raise more corn
to the acre than they do in any OF the
star corn states of the West, and bet
ter corn at that. But in ten years
there was but one Western state (Ohio)
that exceeded New England in corn
yield, and that by only 3 of a bushel
per acre. OF six corn states" SO.
called. New England exceeded their
ten-year average by "a bushels to the
acre, and it exceeded the average of
the United States by 9.S bushels per
acre.
New England is some on corn, as we
4
sachusetts, who raised 127 bushels to
the acre, or the New Hampshire man
who got 133 I'd bushels to the acre, or
the other New Hampshire man who
harvested over 100 bushels to the acre
from a 40-acre lot. One hundred. bush
els of corn, with the fodder, is worth
in New England in the neighborhoodI
of $125-sometim more, and some
times bit less. Where is the West
ern corn farm that will produce 1925
per acre. right in the midst of a mar
ket that is always eager for more? A !
Connecticut man raised 112 bushels of
she1led corn on an acre, and his boy |
beat him with 121 bushels. A scientific |
test Of one mans crop showed that it
yielded $65.76 per acre actual net profit, |
with every possible expense charged
up to 1t. This Is a rate that would
make a man with hundred-acre corn [
patch rich in a few years, or even
half of it. Sixty-f1Ve hundred dollars
a year from 100 acres is pretty good
for the New England farmer. And
the best thing about it is that he can
do 1t, If he will, and if he has the
corn land. If he has not the corn
land, and has any other one of the
more than 81 varieties of New Eng
land land, he can still get rich, If he
will do what others have done.
It need not be assumed that every
man who plants corn is to get s65 per
acre profit. They won't. They don't
They can, If the conditions are right.
and if they work. It is UP to the man
to see that the conditions are right,
and to work There are other men in
New England who have tested theI
value of their corn crops, and they
have made all the way from $49.26 to
$3.50 per acre. One Rhode Island far
mer raises around 1000 bushels of corn
every year and uses the slower for his
sflo.- He figures that the slower pays
for raising the corn and that his 1000 I
bushels are all clear profit. 1t means
81, 800 of clear profit on the corn If it
sells for much IS cents per
bushel- He does not sell it, but feeds
it to stock and gets his money in pay
for milk and pigs In mid-Massachu
sets man made $50 per acre on hts
corn.
It may be thought that I have been
selecting prize corn field to mention,
and I have. There is no reason why
prize fields. allowing for different land.
The prize fields were the ones that
gave the big profits. But let us take
IN example that was not a. prize field;
1t least was not planted or raised with
any idea of making of it a prize field.
4 man in western Massa chusetts con-
GUIDED to p1ow up a meadow that had
not been doing as well in grass as he :
thought it should. He plowed it and .
planted it to corn, giving it only or
lfnary care Nature was on his side, {
md in the fall he found that he ac- {
ua11y had a champion field of corn
% bushels of shel1ed dry corn to the
acre. His land was not remarkable
he gave it only ordinary treatment.
He got the corn that really took a
orize, as he entered 1t after he was
Ill ready to harvest it, and when he
lad been for some weeks ignorant of
is progress. ID
New England farmers are raising
nore and more corn each year. The
L1rnost universal use of the ensilageI
or feed has promoted the raising Of
orn For that feed it was for many {
ears the custom to use green corn, {
With the ears not grown. But after {
while ripe corn became to be used, {
he ears being allowed to nearly ma !
ure and being cut into the siIo. Then )
ornebody discovered that the fodder }
f dead ripe corn makes good s11age,
fter the ripened ears have been taken }
IF: and somebody discovered that the }
odder was worth as much for feeding 7
8 the cost of growing the corn, leav-
ag all of the corn for profit, which (
ne prudent and thrifty farmer feeds (
, COWS and hogs and takes his pay in {
ilk and pork
Corn is a fine, clean crop to raise.
1most all the work may be done from (
le seats Of machines. The land can
E p1owed with a sulky pillow, the man -
a l.
owing done with a harrow, which the
Lrmer rides, the planting done by a :
Prise planter the cultivating done the }
.me way the fuslzing done by ma ?