The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1922-08-18
BACK TO THE FARM

from the farms are j~ustifying the
predictions which we have been max
ing for more than a year to the eff
feet that the haphazard methods Of
farming prevalent in this county for
many years must be abandoned, and
that those people who expect to make
their farms profitable must give
them personal attention, see to the
proper working of them, and quit
talking politics under the court
house shade trees as well as quit
sitting on the counters in the stores
chewing tobacco.
Farmers. must go back to the
farms, if not to make their homes,
certainly for the purpose of seeing
that good farming is done. 1t IS true
that the better farmers of the coun-
ty have for a number of years re-
sided in the, towns and at the county
seat, but that does not mean that
they have been ~neglecting their
farms.
You will see bankers, merchants
andi business men in Abbeville and
in the other towns who set apart GER
tain hours in every day for the pur-
pose of looking after their farms,
and they are diligent about the task.
These men are back at the. farms al
ready. But there are a large number
of men in Abbeville and in other
places who own farms, some large
and some small, who have been sit
ting, down these many years de-
manding and receiving 1.-TWO bales
to the horse" These men have a les
son to learn, if they have not already
learned it.
That lesson may be learned by in
speeding the crops around Abbeville
where intelligent supervision has
been given these crops and those
where this has not been done, even
though the crops have been worked
we'll otherwise. The crop of H. o.
Speed on the Anderson road will
showi what attention to details and
intelligent cultivation and poisoning
will do towards making cotton.
There aresmaHy farmers in the coun-
ty who have as good land as Mr..
Speed and who have worked as in
dustriously as he has perhaps, but
who are not meeting with the same
success due largely to failure to use
poison for killing the weevils. But
many more are in still more serious
condition from a failure to give the
growing of crops on their farms any
attention whatever.
The results this year are going
to show what can be done, we think,
towards raising cotton. It looks now
as if the day of big cotton crops has
passed for this section, but we be-
lieve that the results will show that
cotton may still be grown with some
profit by those who are willing to
make the proper expenditures, do
the necessary work, and supervise
the growing of the crop as it should
be supervised. Whether or not the
results of poisoning are going to be
such that we could advise a statutory
requirement that every man plant
ing cotton poison it, we are as yet
unable to decide. If the results shall
indicate that twice as much cotton
a be grown by poisoning as with
out it, it would seem reasonable to
make such requirement. No man has
a right to keep on his premises al
agency destructive of the prosperity
of his neighbor. A farmer who plants
cotton, and does not undertake to
kill the weevils, matches the pests
for all his neighbors. If it can be
shown with any degree of certainty
that the weevils may be destroyed
by poison, then it is going to follow
that every mar must be required
when planting cotton to prepare to
use poison to protect himself first,
and his neighbor as well.
The government is on the right
track. A poison for the weevil has
been discovered. Sooner or later the
nee of that noison is going to he Der-