370 ANNUAL, REPORT OF THE Off. Doc. 



in Ohio it is a little over half a bushel; in Indiana it is three tenths 

 of a bushel; in Illinois, it is about one and a quarter bushels; in Mis- 

 souri it is one-fifth of a bushel, and in Nebraska, as already stated, 

 it is over two bushels, or nearly the same as in the old State of Penn- 

 sylvania. In the state last named the question of original fertility 

 may be set entirely aside; and in periods of so great a length as 

 twenty years, the effects of exceptionally good or bad seasons will 

 be so nearly balanced that these too, may be left out of considera- 

 tion. 



"The figures for Pennsylvania may, therefore, be pretty confi- 

 dently interpreted as a sign of substantial agricultural progress. 

 The figures of several of the other states that show increasing yields, 

 may be less convincing, but it should be remembered that such gains 

 as stand to the credit of the last twenty years immediately pre- 

 ceding, have been in spite of the greatest discouragement that 

 wheat growers have ever known; for the period from 1888 to 1907, in- 

 clusive, comprises many years in which the price of wheat scarcely 

 covered the cost of production in the very states where agricultural 

 practice is at its best, and where the most progressive farmers were 

 to a large extent drawn into other lines of agricultural produc- 

 tion." 



So much for advancement in our grand old Commonwealth. But 

 instead of a gain of a little more than two bushels in average yield 

 in d, period of forty years, we can in the next twenty years, by strict 

 attention to business, with the assistance of the light that is coming 

 from our Departments of Agriculture, National, and State, supple- 

 mented by our Board of Agriculture and Farmers' Institutes, near- 

 ly or quite double the yield of sixteen and six-tenths bushels with 

 which we are now credited, if we will but make the best use of our 

 opportunities. Every wide awake farmer realizes that we have been 

 spreading over too many acres. The recent very low price for wheat 

 and high price for labor has made it imperative that we produce 

 more bushels from less acres, get more returns from less labor. 

 Then, there is a great opportunity for improvement in kinds of wheat 

 grown; many bushels may be added to our aggregate by sowing bet- 

 ter varieties. Other bushels may be added by cleaning out foul 

 seed. It is astonishing to see the extent to which cockle prevails in 

 some wheat fields. Passing along the highway, or observing a near- 

 by wheat field from the train, along in June the flowers are often 

 frequent enough to make one think of a flower bed. It seems as 

 though the time had come for a determined effort to be made to 

 overcome the loss occasioned by foul seed. The ordinary wind mill 

 won't clean it out. Cockle in wheat, smut in corn, are entirely too 

 prevalent, and should not be tolerated to the extent that they now 

 prevail. 



To combat these and other pests, as well as to make a general ad- 

 vance along the whole line agriculturally, would it not be well for 

 each township to maintain a seed farm for testing in search of best 

 varieties, to disseminate clean seed, and teach better methods of cul- 

 tivation? How about the Township High School or the Consoli- 

 dated School? The towns are setting up shops, getting tools, teach- 

 ing manual training, endeavoring to make their pupils adepts at 

 trades, which is all right; but we can't all live as tradesmen. What 

 is to hinder our setting up a School of Agriculture on a farm in con- 



