The Idaho Republican. [volume] (Blackfoot, Idaho) 1904-1932, 1917-06-25

Saturday from Eugene H. Grubb, the
greatest potato expert of the world
and he sat with us for two hours In
the office and at luncheon at Sage.
hurst and In his delightful way shed
information on better farming and
uncovered the secrets of plant growth
and how to subdue the soil and cause
it to release its plant food.
Mr.. Grubb's home Is at Carbon
dale, Colorado, and he visited this
county twice before, the first time
with the demonstration train operat-
ed by the Oregon Short Line about
seven years ago, and again in 1913
to investigate potato diseases in this
county. Each time he came this way
he did the farmers and stockmen a
favor by telling them a number of
things thru the press to enable them
to make their acres yield more.
On the occasion of his visit in 1918
he was tabulating potato diseases as
he found them in the fields in mid
summer. His work was of a national
scope and returning to his own state
he passed out information to the po-
tato growers that enabled them to
come back" in potato production
where the industry seemed ruined.
Mr. Grubb is constantly bubbling
over with information agricultural
and one has only to be interested and
learned about potatoes Saturday that
farmers should remember all the
time is that it requires five years to
prepare the soil and seed for crop
Of potatoes. The soil needs to be
put thru a rotation of clover of some
species to give it the legumes and
nitrogen, with manuring and fall
plowing, then planting with selected
seed from choice stock that has no
disease and farmer is on the way
to profitable crop. Mr.. Grubb says
the average farmer is guesser and
a gambler who watches the potato
market and jumps in when seed is
high and without proper preparation
raises poor crop and probably goes
up against a bad market besides. The
right way to do Is to rotate the crops
so he will always have tract clean
ed and fertilized to proper condition
for potatoes. When we say cleaned
we mean having been farmed in
grain and clovers for four years un-
til all the potato disease is out of it,
and the right potato plant foods are
into it. Mr.. Grubb remarked that
Idaho's potato acreage this year is
100 per cent greater than last year
and the sugar beet acreage is 25 per
cent below last year. That the de-
mand for sugar Is increasing and
sugar promises to keep on soaring.
Mr.. Grubb says the humble pota-
to and the sugar beet will be the
greatest producers of wealth for this
valley for many years to come. That
this climate being adapted to their
growth, they will be leading crops
here; that the beet crop because 1t
requires a great deal of hand labor
will draw population, or at least
laborers into the country, and that
intensive farming will come rapidly
in connection with much wealth.
That they are both subject to many
fungus diseases, and on that account
no man is safe in raising beets or po-
tatoes unless he rotates his crops,
and this will introduce and foster the
stock business. Rotating the crops
is the insurance that every prudent
farmer will carry or pay the penalty
in occasional disaster from diseases
In his crops.
Some of the things Mr.. Grubb
commanded ye editor to tell the
farmers for him are:
Plant roots are the greatest cul-
tivators and warmers of the soil.
Sweet clover deposits nitrogen and
humus in the soil and mellows the
ground like deep plowing The dry
farmer who wants to enrich his land
and deepen the seedbed at slight eX-
pense should seed it to sweet clover
and let it do the work while his
animals forage upon it.
Mr. Grubb has many times been |
the guest of such men as Edison and |
and he chats along and
tells things he learned from them.
He has made number Of trips |
abroad, and because of his great
of plant growth and the
means of propagation of plants in
new strains, he has been guest at