The Lancaster news. [volume] (Lancaster, S.C.) 1905-current, 1916-02-29
Don't Let Any Muddy Water
Leave Your Farm.

farmer. Muddy water means wa
ter freighted with the cream of
sour soils, with expensive plant
foods; muddy water pouring
down our creeks and river means
that somewhere soils are gully
ing, washing and wasting, and
farmers are becoming poorer and
poorer year after year.
Let's stop this waste. Let's
henceforth see to it that all wa
ters leaving our farms are clear
and clean. and not carrying
with them plant foods that have
cost us hard work and hard cash.
OF course the excess rainfall
must be gotten rid of, but let's
make it go through the soil
rather than mover it; instead of
letting it rob us, let's make it
work for us.
Don't ever think this matter
of muddy water is not important
for, in truth, it is so very impor-
tant that the farmer who neg
lects it is on the road to faslure.
Soil maintenance and soil build
ing lie at the very foundation
of successful farming, and the
man who fails to look to them,
as his first, biggest and ever
present job, had better seek an
other calling.
Muddy water and land wash
ing away really mean the same
thing, and the longer we study
the problem the greater faith
have we in winter cover crops of
crimson clover, vetch, rye, or
oats as means of solving it.
Since the December rains began
all cotton fields unprotected by
a carpet of green have been
wasting their very best plant
food elements. Tons and tons of
nitrogen, at $500 ton. have
gone, lost to our fie DIS forever.
: On the other hand, the fields pro-
tected by cover crops have not
only held their fertility for the
summer crops, but where covered
with the cloverS or vetches, have
been enriched with great guam
titles of nitrogen from the air.
Let's make the South a land
of painted farm houses" has long
been a Progressive Farmer
slogan; now we propose another /;
"A carpet of winter green for
every Southern farm Our
choice above all is crimson Glow
er, because it is not only leg
ume, nitrogen-gatherer, but it
is also well adapted to wide
range of soil and climatic condi~
tionS. Next comes vetch, which
is legume and also does well
nearly all over the South. But if
neither vetch nor clover are
grown, rye, preferably Abruzzi,
is an excellent winter and spring
growth. If none of the above can
be planted, ordinary oats, plant
ed in September or October,
will, even if plowed under in
March, be worth several dollars
an acre in keeping the land COW
cred and protected from the win
ter rains.
So really there is wide list
from which a choice may be
made-so wide, indeed, that
there is simply no excuse for our
leaving our fields in their
shameful nakednesS. If you can't
plant clover or vetch, plant rye !;
if you can't plant rye, plant oats.
And don't just plant patches !;
plant acres, fields, your whole
farm. Paint the winter land.
scape green; change it from an
ugly brown to a bright emerald
that will be the talk of the coun.
". Progressive farmers every
where are doing this, and find
ing it the road to wealth, and
you, too, can do as well.
"A carpet Of green in winter
for every Southern farm"
won't you help us make this ideal
come true by seeing to it that
there is one on your fields here
after r?-Progressive Farmer.
UyL.A a.