The weekly times-record. (Valley City, N.D.) 1912-1922, 1915-05-06
BARNES COUNTY FARMING
IS ATTRACTING ATTENTION

The improvement in farming meth
DDS in Barnes county is made the sub
ject of a special bulletin just issued
by the North Dakota experiment sta
tion. That this bulletin will give the
county wide advertising cannot be
doubted, as it is sent to many parts of
the country. The bulletin follows:
The county agricultural work is
speeding up farming in Barnes county.
This work is carried on in cooperation
between the county commissioners
and the North Dakota experiment sta
ton. Edwin Maryland is the county
agricultural agent for the southern
part of the county, while T. x. Calnan
works in the northern part. The coun-
ty field agents in turn cooperate with
the farmers who are interested in
planting crops like corn and alfalfa, or
rotation or hog pastures, or whatever
the enterprise may be.
Demonstration work has been one of
the prominent features of this work
and the crop that has received perhacs
the most attention is alfalfa. At the
present time there are alfalfa demon
stration fields in every township, in
fact 100 farmers are cooperating in
this work with an average of seven
acres each. The yields of hay in 1914
for the southern part were three and
one-third tons from the fields seeded
in 1912 and two tons on the 1913 seed
ing. In the northern part the yields
were two and one-fourth tons on all
the fields. Alfalfa growing is being
extended very rapidly, as the farmers
are beginning to realize that they can
not afford to be without this highly
valuable forage and pasture crop.
The corn work has consisted largely
in securing the best varieties and in
demonstrating the value of home
grown seed. The corn mostly grown
has been the Northwestern Dent. This
is, however, being replaced by Mime
sofa No. 13 and Rustler's White Dent.
as soon as homegrown seed can be
secured of these varieties. Over 1000
bushels of seed corn was saved last
fall. Seed plots are also used in i'm
proving the corn and the varieties that
will be grown in these from now on
are Minnesota No. 10 and Rustler's
White Dent. The average yield of ma.
ture corn last year was 40 bushels per
acre.
Crop rotation is another activity
that is meeting with good deal of sue
cess, as it is bringing increased yields
The rotation that is being used prin'
cipall is corn MANFRED, followed by
wheat seeded down to clover and tim.
othy, which is left for hay the next
year; this followed by wheat or flax,
then barley and oats. Where more
corn is wanted this rotation can DE
shortened, or where less corn is desir'
ed, as may be the case on large farms,
the rotation can be heightened. This
system does away with the wasteful
practice of summer following and in
stead brings in a crop Of corn, which
is one of the most valuable crops that
can be raised for feed. The clover and
timothy adds nitrogen and humus to
the soil. The crop rotation with live
stock seems to be the one method OF
farming which permits the diversified:
, ton of every acre of land to the full
est extent
The demonstrations in pork produc'
ton through using pastures and hog
ging-down corn have brought out the
fact that by this system the cost OF
production can be much reduced; IN
some cases from Is to 40 per cent. 1t
has also been brought out that the
most profitable pigs are the ones far
rowed early, as they will be old
enough to make full use of the early
summer pasture. and can be finished or
almost finished in the field by the hog
ging-down process, while the late ones
will not get much from the summer
pastures and will have to be yard-fed
through part Of the winter, which
makes the cost of production much
higher. The live stock work has con
sisted in creating a demand for more
and better stock. Forty-one pure-brcd
sires have been placed in the county
during the year. A number of these
are owned and used comparatively by
groups of farmers, thereby reducing
the cost of pure-bred sire per farm
er and at the same time securing
greater returns from each one, and il
means, too, that the foundation has
been laid for community breeding cen
tiers.
The members of the dairy testing
occociatinn have the mast wear had