The Idaho Republican. [volume] (Blackfoot, Idaho) 1904-1932, 1919-08-29


The potato industry has not kept
pace with the sugar beet industry.
The great fluctuations in the price of
potatoes is responsible for this lack
of growth. A most excellent potato
can be grown in this section of the
county and the yield per acre COM
pares very favorably with any other
section of the state. The average
shipments for the past two years
have averaged fifty-three cars per
annum. The average weight per car
would approximate $4,000 pounds.
In 1918 the government demanded
that cars be filled to maximum. This
amount of potatoes was obtained
from about 230 acres. Some grow
ers have obtained as high as $50 to
500 bushels of potatoes per acre.
Dairy Industry Growing
At one time the dairy industry was
spreading rapidly over the Aberdeen
country, but prices for butter fat
three and four years ago caused
many of the larger operators to go
out of business. Since then butter
fat has been bringing much better
prices and the industry is picking
up. However, there are no large
operators in this section. While the
shipment of cream now reaches the
total of little over 1000 ten-gallon
can per year this amount of cream
represents host of small produc-
ers of from one to eight cows with
an average of between three and
four cows per operator.
Sheep Raising
For the past three years the sheep
industry has brought much business
into this end of the county. In 1917
over 1,250,OO0 pounds of wool was
shipped out of Aberdeen. In 1918 a
little over a million pounds was
shipped out and in 1919 over one
million five-hundred tn GU n d
pounds of wool were shipped out.
Thousands of head of sheep are win
tered in this section using a very
large percentage of the alfalfa hay
grown here. The growth of the
sheep industry is in large part due
to the closely at hand spring and fall
range on the desert west of Aber-
deem. 1t would be far better to en-
courage the use of this desert as a
sheep range than to destroy it for
grazing purposes by encouraging dry
farming settlers to locate on the land,
fence it and attempt dry farming and
tind in few years that dry farming
is not successful as permanent bust
ness on these desert lands. There
are excellent dry farming lands in
Idaho and the new settlers should
be diverted towards these sections
if they are looking for dry farming
lands. 1t is a short sighted policy
to destroy one good, profitable in
dustry by permitting another to come
in which has very little hopes for sue
cess.
Dry Farming
Southwest of Aberdeen the dry
farming industry has been found
profitable. This is due to two dis
tinct conditions a deeper soil and
freedom from lava rock permitting
the land to be farmed in large areas,
cheaply and efficiently. While pre-
cipitation records have not been kept
in this end of the county it is as
sumed that the southwest corner re-
ceives more rainfall than does Aber-
deem. This is given weight when it
is considered that the rainfall at
Aberdeen averages 9.65 inches for
seven years and American Falls re-
ceives and average of 1883 for a
longer period of time
The cereal crop has been greatly
increased owing to the great demand
for cereal crops and to the good
prices to be paid for same. The
southwest dry farm area is averaging
five to six bushels per acre, nearly
all Turkey winter wheat. The ir-
rigated land this year will average
twenty-five bushels of wheat per
acre. The average in barley and
oats has an estimated yield of forty
five bushels per acre.
Field and Garden Peas
Bingham county is particularly
we'll adapted to the production of
field and garden peas. The field pea
makes an excellent hog feed and by
hogging off the crop saves the farmer
much labor and trouble. One grower
turned in a bunch Of hogs on a three
acre field of peas and in a fifty-one
day feeding period each hog put on
an average gain in weight per day of
a little over two pounds. On the
station field and garden
peas have yielded up to seventy
bushels per acre of threshed, re-
cleaned seed. Many varieties have
averaged over forty bushels per acre
for several years.
FIRTH II