The Carlisle independent., 1921-03-03
RAISERS OF RICE IN
 DIRE STRAITS
Acreage This Year Will Be From One-
 Third to Half That of 1920

Stuttgart, Feb. 28-A visit to De- Witt, Gillett and Stuttgart and inter views with rice growers, bankers and merchants at each place, have con vinced H. M. Cottrell, agriculturist of the Arkansas Profitable Farming Bu- reau of the Little Rock Board of Com merce, that the acreage that will be sown to rice in Arkansas county this year probably will not be more than half that of 1920 and is likely to be not more than one-third, MT. Cottrell said here today.
 The largest acreage ever raised in the county was grown last year. Its quality was exceptionally good and the yield per acre high. There has been practically no sale since harvest until during the last two weeks. In the last two weeks rice has been nov ing in small quantities at price of one-third to one half of the cost of production. Most of the enormous crop of last year is in the hands of the growers who produced it at the highest cost per bushel ever known in eastern Arkansas.
 A conservative banker told Mr Cot trell that most of the large growers would have been better off financially if instead of harvesting their high yielding rice last year they had let it rot in the field. Prices so far offered are not sufficient to pay for the cost of harvesting and threshing.
 Growers are waiting to find how much credit they can get from the banks and the merchants, whom they already owe much more than the rice on hand will pay, and the acreage will be limited to the amount of new credit that the banks and stores are able to give. This is the first time that the rice growers have been badly hit and most of them want to keep growing every acre of rice possible and noth- ing else.
 Little Land Flowed
 Little land was plowed in February. The area is not appreciable, compared with the total in rice last year. Few farmers have hauled straw or manure during the winter, although it has heen demonstrated that corn can be pro- duced profitably on well drained rice land that has been manured or thickly covered with rice straw The straw IS generally burned.
 The most thoughtful men in the dis trict advise the sowing of rice on the best land only, and letting the other land go this year without any other crop. Bankers and others who give credit are asking the men who can pay only small part of what they owe, to SOW only so much land in rice as can be handled by home help, and not use hired labor until harvest
 Farmers and business men who have kept watch of the supply and demand for rice throughout the world are al- most unanimous in saying that rice iii 1921 must be raised, harvested and  milled at a cost not to exceed S1 a eushel, or it will be raised at loss.
 Are Raising Little Feed
 It is probable that the rice growers as whole will not raise half the feed that will be needed on their farms. al though number of feed crops do well when the land is manured.
 L. K. Buerkle, vice president of the First National Bank, Stuttgart, is put ting the ashes from rice hulls on land intended for corn. He has already hauled 300 tons of these ashes from the rice mill to his farm. He has found that while the ashes contain practical ly no plant food, they make the soil mellow, so that it holds moisture dur ing the summer drouth and keeps the corn thriving. In 1920, he raised 60