The weekly times-record. (Valley City, N.D.) 1912-1922, 1915-04-08
GOVERNMENT DATA
ON DRY FARMING


light, the federal government is carry
ing on Investigations in the western
plains states. Four of these points
are located in North Dakota, where
the work is cooperation between
the federal government and the ex'
periments station. That the result OF
these Investigations are given in Bull
letin 10, North Dakota experiment
station.
The bulletin makes the statement
that all moisture that is available for
crop production in this section is
what falls as rain or snow, the wat
er table in these sections being too
far from the surface, as a rule, for
any of the moisture to reach the sur
face. The statement is also made
that the three means by which water
is removed from the soil that the
plant roots occupy, ISL first, by evap'
Grafton from the surface, which, how
ever, is slight; second, through seep-
age below where the plant roots can
reach, and this is also slight; third,
through the plant. So that when
moisture is once in the soil nearly all
of it stays there till the plants remove
it. This gives a clue to the farm prac'
tice that needs to be employed.
Weeds will remove this moisture as
readily as the crops and hence the
weeds should be kept down. 1t also
emphasizes the fact that the greatest
good done by cultivation is in keeping
down weeds. Trials have been made
with summer fallow but it has not
proved to be profitable. 1t has re-
suited in an increase of yield, but at
the same time it takes two years cult.
walton of the land to bring one crop,
or in other words, it requires twice
the acreage.
Trials were also made with corn.
1t was found that nearly as good crops
were secured on corn ground as on
the summer fallow. The corn crop
uses a good deal of moisture, but the
cultivation given it allows the rain to
soak into the ground more readily. In
addition to bringing the land in shape
for growing a grain crop the corn pro-
duces the largest amount of forage of
any of the crops tried. Corn was also
found to be one of the surest of the
crops which means that it is one of
the best crops for this section of the
state.
Moisture determinations made of
the soil on which grass crops were
grown showed that these reduced the
moisture more than any other crop
and left the soil so dry that the follow
ing crop of grain was reduced.
Trials were made in green manuring,
but this did not prove profitable
which is undoubtedly due to the fact
that the land is new and not yet in
so much need of organic matter.
Stable manure on the other hand gave
good response and proved that its
application was profitable.
In the study of crop sequence it
was found that wheat produced the
best yield on corn land, second best
on oat land, and third best after
wheat. Oats gave the best yield on
corn land, second best after wheat,
and barley, and third best after oats.
Barley likewise gave the best yield
after corn and the poorest after bar
ley.
Experiments are being tried ont in
the rotation of crops. These are u.s.
ually short, three to four years. In
order to bring in cultivated crop Of
ten in the trials comparing spring
and fall blowing it was found that
some times one gave the best results
and sometimes the other, though the
results were slightly in faver of the
spring blowing which indicates that
the blowing can be done so as to be
made to fit in with the other work the
best.
In preparing corn land for grain
crop it was found that disking was
the most satisfactory 1t was found
also that the harrow was as satisfac.
tory as the weeder for cultivating
grain that was up. The rainfall that
would be- stored in the soil was not
sufficient to produce a crop unless sup.
plemented by some rain during the
growing season, and it was found that
in the summer falllow about one-third
Of the seasons rainfall could be stor.
ed up which is smaller amount than
it had often been thought could be
saved in this way. -- ...~
These results will prove very valu'
able as they have been carefully
worked out at different points which
makes it possible to eliminate any