254: BOAED OF AGEICTJLTURE. 



whom all applicants who desire certificates as expert judges must pass 

 an examination. Certificates will be issued by this board to all success- 

 ful applicants. 



Election of oflicers for the ensuing year was then taken up by the 

 Association and the election resulted as follows: 



President — D. F. Maish, Frankfort, Indiana. 

 Vice-President — J. P. Davis, Sheridan, Indiana. 

 Secretary -Treasurer — A. G. Mace, Lexington, Indiana. 



Owing to the absence of J. H. Gwaltney, of Poseyville, Indiana, who 

 was to give a talk on ''Seed Bed and Cultivation of Corn," Mr. Collins, of 

 Carniol. was asked to take his place upon the program, which ho did, and 

 gave the following interesting tallv: 



An old, successful farmer once said that he did not understand why 

 we had to use so costly machinery nowadays: that when lie was a boy 

 he paid lU cents to sharpen a barshare, and that he broke his corn ground 

 with it, harrowed it with a wooden-toothed harrow, marked it otf with 

 a single shovel, dropped corn by hand, covered it Avith a straddle-jack 

 and tended it with the single shovel; tliat he grew sixty bushels per acre 

 and Avas out 1<) c(>nts, and his tools were not worth ten dollars. Now we 

 must have every stump out, ride a fifty-dollar break-plow, twenty-five- 

 dollar liarrow, twenty-dollar roller and a twenty-seven-dollar cultivator. 

 You work your corn from four to six times and don't secure any larger 

 yield than he did. 



My answer is embraced in two propositions — 



1. In proportion as you work the humus out of your soil you will be 

 compelled to use more costly and complicated machinery and to do more 

 work on the land to wrench a profitable crop out of it. 



2. In proportion as you return the humus to the soil and reinstate 

 a natural seed bed will you be able to raise a profital)le crop any old Avay. 



Onr common seed beds are faulty in many ways, one of which is being 

 too liMi-d; lliat is, being puddled on account of lack of liunius. The other 

 is in being too loose. This sometimes luiitpens by tuiiiiiig under vast 

 (|uantities of strawy crops. This latter condition is made worse by iiin- 

 ning the cultivator too deep in the first plowing. 



If the soil is mellow it should be allowed to remain firm in its lowt'r 

 parts. Nature delights in a firm seed bed for root growth. All she asks 

 is that it not be puddled. When Mr. Crawford grew his champion straw- 

 berries and vines he pounded liis seed bed Avith a maul. If it had been 

 as void of humus as some of onr fields it would have turned to brick. It 

 contained enough vegetable matter to preveid puddling and not enough 

 to make it fluffy and open. 



