Southern planter - The W&M Digital Archive

1908.] THE SOUTHEKN PLANTER 33
rarely produced over ten to fifteen bushels per acre of
corn; now great improvement is everywhere apparent
and yields of thirty bushels of corn per acre are common
to all the fields, the best going much higher. Forty
acres of this land has increased its fertility to such an
extent as to be successfully planted in alfalfa. Twenty-
five acres are still devoted to this crop, while a small field
occupied for four years, and from which twenty crops of
hay have been harvested, was last year planted in corn
In June and no fertilizer used. Fositive information of
exact yield is not yet to hand, but several of our farmers
predicted seventy-five bushels per acre just before harvest
The comparative merits of the two crops—cow peas
and soja beans—are often discussed. It has been clearly
shown that when harvested for hay before developing
seed the results in soil fertility are essentially alike, but
if both are permitted to mature seed it will be found that
the soja bean has carried from the soil a greater quantity
of fertility, because the quantity of seed is greater and
the grain itself is much richer in nitrogen than the grain
of the cow pea.
Experience in 1905 abundantly corroborates the above.
In spring of 1904, two adjoining fields—one of twenty-five
acres, the other of thirty-two acres—were planted simultaneously—the
former in cow peas, the latter in soja
beans—both at the rate of one bushel per acre, put out
with a wheat drill. The fields were fairly similar in fer-
tility and received the same preparation. In August, the
peas were made into hay. The beans were permitted
to mature their seed and were not harvested until
Both fields made large crops—the yield of beans in
late.
seed
being enormous. , These fields were sown in wheat, after
thorough preparation with disc harrow. At harvest the
field }n cow peas yielded about twenty bushels of wheat
per acre, while the field in beans gave a return of about
ten bushels. At the time of the harvest of the beans a
calculation of the quantity of nitrogen removed by this
large crop of seed justified the prediction that there was
not enough of this element left in the soil to produce a
maximum crop of wheat. The final results fulfilled thia
prediction.
Care in the selection and planting of the seed of every
crop grown, the use of all available home-made manure,
aided by every labor-saving implement, coupled with pursuit
of the above rotation, will, it is believed, make every
acre of land not only very productive, but sufficiently
remunerative during the regeneration to give a handsome
living to the farmer.
Fearing that the supply of potash, now so heavily drawn
on by the increased crops, might be getting low, every
few years experiments are made with this ingredient to
test the present available quantity.
So far, no indication of a deficiency has been manifested,
nor do I believe an application of potash manures
will be necessary as long as the crops grown upon the
land are fed to stock and the resulting manure carefully
returned to the fields. WM. C. STUBBS.
Gloucester Co., Va.
THE NEED OF THE SOUTH—INTENSIVE NOT EX-
TENSIVE FARMING.
.Editor Southern Planter:
In reading the agricultural journals and bulletins Issued
by the Experiment Stations, it is a very obvious fact that
the most prosperous farmers, and the most successful, are
the class that devote their energies to a very small area
compared to the great plantations that in ante-bellum day*
were the pride and the boast of the South.
(Mr. Editor, please note
gard to the South only).
what I say is spoken In re-
But circumstances have changed completely. The Slav*
of yesterday has become the lord (?) of to-day. The great
plantations with their quarters and overseers are only a
memory and the intent of the law is that each human
being shall reap the reward of his own labor. The Southern
planter in his endeavor to reap the same income aa
that before ithe '60's, rented his fields to untutored labor
with the result of a complete failure to himself and the
tenant. What were once fertile and productive fields were
replaced by broomsage and deep washes, and later on by
the friendly pine. The tenant moved to more promising
fields, and the disappointed landlord saw what was once
the pride of his intelligence and the boast of his tongue
pass from his hands to satisfy his creditors, and he him-
self "broke up housekeeping" to live with some of hia
children or grandchildren, or moved to the town from
where, after a few years, he was laid to rest on a stranger's
land.
The framework, the skeleton, of the old plantation la
still with us. The same sun shines upon us, the same
seasons assist our efforts, and the same God listens to
our prayers.
We read every day accounts of how some energetic,
intelligent person has produced five times the amount per
acre upon a small farm through intensive farming and
improved methods, that could have been produced through
the old plan. The salvation of our South is in the small
farm with Intensive methods applied. The Northern
States with their small farms and intensive cultivation
and the disadvantage of long and cold seasons, outrival us
in the money value of their productions per acre. With
educated minds and improved machinery they laugh us
to scorn, notwithstanding our soils are more fertile and
our winters milder.
We are pleased
way and scold at
to continue in the same unprofitable
intelligent advice, while we sacrifice
our labors to ithe customs of tradition. Of course, some one
will wisely ask, "Wherein is our safety?" Turn your faces
toward the North, and there in eternal letters read the
answer from Maine to Maryland, and from the Great
Lakes southwest toward the Pacific Ocean. Learn from
that country where it is not considered a disgrace to one'i
character and a lowering of one's diginty to labor upon
the farm. Our South is inoculated with too great an
abundance of that false pride which will not permit one
to honestly earn his bread following the plow; we must
bury forever our unworthy prejudices against a worthy
immigrant, it matters not whether he hall from Conti-
nental Europe, or from a distant part of our own Union.
And right here I wish to say that I sincerely believe that
the Northern and Western farmer who has come among
us and made our country his country, is the salt to the
whole system. They do not agitate nor do they advocate,
but their examples of untiring labor are gradually working
a revolution over the entire country. We need more
of these living examples, and the finished products of tha