Southern planter - The W&M Digital Archive

1908.]
WORK FOR THE MONTH.
In our review of the results of the year's work on
Southern farms in the December issue, we were unable
THE SOUTHERN PLANTER.
Farm Management.
to give more than an estimate of the yield of the cotton
crop. We stated our belief that the crop would be
materially less than that of the previous year. We are
now in receipt of the official estimate of the crop, which
Is placed by the Department of Agriculture at 11,678,000
bales. This is as we estimated, a large reduction in the
yield in- the previous year, which was estimated at
12,500,000 bales. The crop this year was grown on about
32,000,000 acres, which makes the average yield about one-
third of a bale to the acre. Even though cotton sold at
a much higher price than it is now selling at, or than
it sold at at any time last year, such a yield as this makes
but a miserable poor return for the labor expended with-
out allowing anything for the fertilizer. In no other
branch of Southern agriculture is there more need for a
radical change in methods than in cotton production. It
has been demonstrated in hundreds of cases that a bale
to the acre can be easily made on land of average fertil-
ity properly prepared and worked and more than twice this
yield can be produced on rich land. The production of a
bale to the acre would mean at present prices a fair re-
turn for the labor and fertilizer needed to produce the
crop and would set at liberty over 20,000,000 acres of land
upon which to produce other crops which we now buy
in the markets of the world. The same or very little more
labor would make the cotton crop of one bale to the acre
which is now expended in making a third of a bale and
the time saved in preparing and planting 20,000,000 acres
in cotton could be used to produce corn, wheat, oats, hay
and the leguminous crops on which to raise and feed cat-
tle, sheep and hogs, the market for which products is always
a good one and which, in ithe South, is at present
supplied by the farmers of the North and West. The pro-
duction of live stock would mean the improvement of the
fertility of the land and therewith the capacity to make a
heavy cotton crop on the reduced area at less cost for fertilizer.
Thus while materially reducing land to be worked
and thus saving money on the labor bill as large a cotton
crop would be made, and this at much greater profit. Whilst
there has already been a gratifying increase in ithe in-
terest shown in live stock husbandry in the South yet
there is room for an enormous increase in the production
of meat in the South. We yet keep our meat-house sadly
too ofiten in the West and let the Western farmer make
the profit on its production. We can make this meat at
home cheaper than the Western man can make it and yet
make a larger profit in doing so than he can, and can at
the same itime keep our money at home for improving our
farms and homes.
The report on the area seeded to wheat during the
fall months and its condition in December has just
reached us. From this we find that there has been a re-
duction in the area sown as compared with last year of
about 1 per cent.—equivalent to- a decrease of 596,000
t
acres. The total acreage sown is 31,069,000. Maryland
has sown 772,747 acres as against 796,646 acres sown last
year. Virginia has sown 668,044 acres as against 674,792
sown last year. North Carolina has sown 583,251 acres as
against a similar area last year. South Carolina has
sown 328,128 acres as against a similar area last year.
Tennessee has sown 840,430 acres as against 823,951 acres
sown last year. Tennessee is therefore the only one of
these Southern States showing an increased area seeded.
West Virginia and Kentucky also show less area seeded.
This decreased seeding is much to be regretted as we
need to produce much more wheat in the South rather
than less. We do not make our own bread in any of the
Southern States and this is a serious reproach to us, as
there is no reason whatever why we should not only do
this but also make wheat for export. Probably the decrease
in the area seeded this year is largely to be accounted for
by reason of the late maturing of our summer crops
owing to the cold spring and early summer. Farmers were
too busy saving what had been made to get the land in
order for wheat seeding. The condition of the seeded
crop throughout 'the country is not at all satisfactory, as
is stands only at 91 as against 94 a year ago and a tenyear
average of 93. This decrease in the area sown and
the low condition taken together would indicate that this
year's winter wheat crop is not likely to be an average
one. The failure of the wheat crop to increase in area
which has now been a characteristic for several years
when taken in conjunction with our enormous annual in-
crease in population would seem to indicate that the days
of this country as the great wheat exporting nation of the
world are numbered and that very shortly we shall become
dependent on some other nation for part of our daily
bread. Either the profitable wheat lands are exhausted or
the cost of production has so increased on the old lands
as to make it a non-profitable crop at the average level
of prices fixed by the world's production. Canada and
the Argentine are now forging to the front as the great
wheat-producing countries of this continent. They have
both almost illimitable lands suited for the production of
the crop and neither country has population to consume
anything like even their present production. Argentina is
now harvesting a magnificent crop of wheat which will
all or nearly all be available for export. In the face of
this we do not expect to see wheat advance much in
value. Europe secured a very large share of our reserves
from the crop of 1906 early in the fall of 1907 and can
afford to wait for the the Argentine, Indian and Australian
crops. Notwithstanding this outlook, we are of opinion
that we ought to grow more wheat in the South. It is
a crop for which a market can be found right at home
at a price which will pay the cost of production when the
land is properly prepared for it and it has the great advantage
of being a crop which can be put into the ground
at a time when work does not heavily press on the farmer
and it comes off here in the South in ample time to be
followed by another crop to be harvested the same year.
This crop should be a leguminous one and then the land