1918.] FLTL'KI-: OF THL: NKW KXCL.WI) LI\E stock industry. OO' 



hill farm problem, and the dairy cow is more efficient than is 

 any other animal in the transhjrminjr of grasses, clovers and 

 alfalfas into human food, we must produce something more 

 than raw milk. Hut the moment we consider cheese, we are 

 faced hy the fact that tin- fundamental law holds — we must 

 lace outside competition. The nittuient we consider increas- 

 ed butter j)roduction in \ew England we find that the same 

 ]jrinci])le IimMs. More and better cows will not make flairy 

 farming prohtable unless with them can come greater pro- 

 duction of the feeds on which such stock is produced. 



More Grain the Solution of the I'roblem. 



If. in our own markets, New England is to compete against 

 other sections, against the AA'est and the South, in the pro- 

 duction of animal products, she must raise a much larger 

 portion of the feeds on which these animals are grown. This 

 may mean more corn, or perhaps barley instead of corn, on 

 some of the colder soils. It may also mean the development 

 of local gristmills, so that farmers may have a market for their 

 grains, and at the same time take home with them the milk 

 producing by-products which these grains give. Also, as an 

 essential change in our present farming system the production 

 of more corn means the possibility of more clovers and other 

 legumes. 



Now I know that there will be immediate objections raised 

 to this suggestion of mine, that many will say: "It canT be 

 done;" and others, 'Tt should not be done." But T think I 

 can answ^er all of these objections. Let me try. Let me 

 quote some of the objections already made, and give my 

 answers to the same : ' 



(1) 'Tt is cheaper to buy grain than to raise it." 



How" often in past years have we heard this statement 

 made? The pity of it is that it has been believed unques- 

 tionaldy ! Now I remember the days of really cheap grain 

 here in New England, when forty cents could be traded for 

 a bushel of corn ; and when cottonseed meal could be bought 

 for less than its calculated fertility value. Did this cheap 

 grain make for us a profitable agriculture? You know it did 

 not, and furthermore, you know that it was in the days of 

 cheap grain, in lS03-'91:-'95, that thousands of our farms were 



