.;56 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Sept., 



abandoned, that our pastures commenced to grow up to 

 weeds and -brush, and our land to decrease in fertility. Xo ! 

 The mere fact that we could buy grain for less than our own 

 cost of production meant that farming itself w^as unprofitable. 



(2) "We had best start with more clovers and more al- 

 falfa instead of more grain." 



This objection was raised by an experiment station man at 

 the time some of these suggestions were presented to him. I 

 Avould be tempted to agree with him were it not for the fact 

 that we have preached more clovers and more legumes for 

 the past quarter of a century, and made but little headway. 



This last summer I took a nine hundred mile automobile 

 trip through Connetticut with our own Professor Southwick 

 of the Connecticut Agricultural College. On this trip we 

 saw perhaps a dozen good fields of clover and possibly the 

 same number of "patches" of alfalfa, patches instead of fields. 

 For some reason clover has not made headway. My own 

 belief is that land is plowed too seldom. Until we develop 

 our farming system and our farm organization to a point 

 which will allow the breaking up of some of the grass lands 

 at fairly frequent intervals, we will never be able to grow 

 more than a very, very small area of red clover, or even of 

 alfalfa. 



(3) "High grain prices may not last." 



Now, in its essence this suggestion is the same as number 

 one, and requires no extended answer. Certainly no guar- 

 antee of high prices can be given, but we know that freight 

 rates must rise, and that with this rise we will have in efifect 

 an increased protective tariff on each of the farm products of 

 New England. AVe also know that the soils of the corn belt, 

 which is the great granary of the United States, are long 

 since past the first flush of fertility and now only respond to 

 "the use of artificial fertilizers. These two facts show that in 

 the future, if not in the immediate past. New England can 

 once again compete in the production of grain crops for hu- 

 -man food as well as for animal feeds. 



(4) "Our fields are too small ; it takes too many acres to 

 make a living by grain production." 



Now, there is some point to this objection. However, I am 

 not urging grain production as an end in itself, but simply to 



