The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1924-10-12

No one knows better than the farm
er the advantage of suitable and
economical farm tool to do a certain
lob and most of them dream Of some
day owing such tools but the primary
cost or investment is what apalls them.
They are short on that commercial
mind, willing to take chance in pay
ing 81, 200 per month for a mere hole
in a wall in which to do business.
Conservatism is good thing in its
place but everybody gives it too much
room. 1t never discovers anything,
never tries anything new, in short it
is the very antithesis of progress. The
southern farmer, more than any other
class, are burdened with a brand Of
conservatism that really makes agri-
cultural gloves of them-who is going to
lift them out of their bondage-The
Age-Herald is, doing its share. The pub
lie schools must finally come to the
rescue. r
Remove The Stumps
The Age-Herald has its stumps so
does every business organization al
though they are speedily disappearing
from organized business. With the
farmer, the process of removal is slow.
The writer has recently visited in the
| interest of The Age-Herald a number
of stump buFdened farms, some OF
which have been in cultivation for more
than ten years. Its a wonder that some
statistician hound has not informed us
the acreage occupied on the southern
farms by useless and unsightly stumps
or the measure of labor required to
hoe around these stumps and the
monetary loss OccasiOned through mac
| tive soil. There is certainly great room
for the speculative mind. The writer
| found many farmers who had or were
removing all stumps and was amazed
to learn that some experts were taking
| contracts to remove stumps as low
| as 10 to 25c each. There are many
stumps that win cost the farmer much
more in a single season than the ex-
pense of removal; then, why the
stumps?
There is no answer because there is
no accounting for indifference and GER
tain view points not confined to farm
ers but peryades every line of human
endeavOr as well as politics and govern
ment.
Money In Pigs
On a recent trip for The Age-Herald
through south Alabama and Mississippi,
the writer was struck with the unusual
scarcity of hogs. During whole days
low not a single stray pig was seen,
yet meat is high, an item that all
farmers complained Of. could not get
| at the cause yet there were exceptions
/ found one farmer woman who showed
me her pig. She had paid two dollars
for it some two months past, had fed
! it nothing except the waste from the
house. 1t would have weighed over 100
pounds and can easily be made into a
porker, through proper feeding, to dress
200 pounds by December.
Many farmers told me that there is
no profit in hogs This may be so
when an effort is made to grow them
commercially or as a sale crop but for
home consumption, no such conclusion
could be the truth.
The farmer, not much different from
town folks arrive at conclusions
through mere heresy that have no sound
basis upon which to rest and without
proof of an actual experiment. The
farmer can visualize the doctrine to
grow his own bread abut the production
of the essential meat seems to be a
lost art with most southern farmers.
Questions And answers
Q. Can you tell us which one of
the grains is best to SOW with vetch
and how much vetch should be used
to the acre? c.. H, Wetumpka, Ala.
A. This depends on what you desire
! in the resulting crop and is also a
varieties of wheat are very satisfac.
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