410 FARMERS' INSTITUTES. 



Where the line of cost is above the line of income the crop is raised at a 

 loss, and in the cases where the two lines cross, the point of intersection 

 shows the point where profit ends and loss begins. 



Thus at $1.00 per bushel this point is reached at a yield of about 38 bush- 

 els, while at 75 cents per bushel the limit of profit is reached at about 27 

 bushels. At $2.00 per bushel all of the plats would yield a profit, and at 50 

 cents per bushel all of them would bring a loss. [See Diagram on opposite 

 page.] 



Thus yields that may be profitably secured during high prices are 

 attended with loss as the market price falls. The highest yields are not an 

 offset for the lowest prices. Reduced expenses and consequent moderate 

 yields are the legitimate remedy for low prices. This seems hard doctrine, 

 but it is Nature's method of adjusting the balance between supply and 

 demand. As prices fall, profits per acre must decrease. This consequence 

 is inevitable. 



What is the lesson of these figures? It is plain and easy of application. 

 During periods of high prices, great yields are profitable. The income per 

 acre is large. Then is the time to manure heavily, to put the farm in the 

 best possible condition, that it may be able to produce the best of crops at 

 least expense when low prices shall come, as they surely will. We are now 

 in the trough of the wave of prices. When the crest shall come, let us for- 

 tify ourselves against the succeeding period of depression by improving the 

 condition of our soils. 



Many a farmer is looking to the commercial fertilizers to increase his 

 crops and his revenue. Don't do it. It costs now 84 cents for fertilizer — 

 enough to raise a bushel of wheat, and so far as commercial fertilizers are 

 concerned for growing wheat their residues do not remain in the soil. 

 Under Lawes and Gilbert's treatment such plots fertilized ever so heavily 

 showed no tendency to increased yield. There was no accumulated fertility. 

 All this is not true of farm-yard manure. It does not cost cash ; its residues 

 do remain in the soil, and if liberally applied the land gains in fertility. 

 Good home-made, old fashioned manure is the sheet anchor of good farming 

 in this country. 



Is all this an argument for low yields and poor farming during periods of 

 low prices? No ; it only asserts the fact that as the average yield increases 

 the cost per bushel of increase rises, the profit on each additional bushel is 

 less and less, till ultimately a point will be reached where the next bushel 

 will cost more than it will sell for. Then it were better not raised at all, 

 for it only swallows the profits of other bushels more cheaply raised. To 

 persist in increasing the yield by producing the last bushels at a loss is poor 

 farming. Profits per acre begin to decline when one bushel is raised at a 

 loss. This is long before the line of cost crosses the line of income where 

 the limit of profit is reached, and far below possible further increase. Thus 

 in diagram 2 the greatest profit is at about 36 bushels, if at one dollar 

 per bushel, but at 75 cents it is greater at 18 bushels than any at higher 

 yield. So long as the space widens between the lines of cost and of 

 income per acre (diagram 2) so long is profit per acre increasing. When 

 they begin to approach each other, some bushels are produced at a loss, and 

 the total profit is lessened. When they cross, all profit has been swallowed 

 in growing the last bushels. Whatever the price, grow every bushel in 



