The Bulletin. 77 



own use. Also because our average yield for the State is only about 15 bushels, 

 when many farmers in the different counties testify that, when they have 

 given it the proper attention, they have raised from 50 to 100 bushels per 

 acre, showing conclusively that many farmers produce much less than 15 

 bushels per acre, and that if we can produce from 50 to 100 bushels on a 

 few acres, we can produce it on many more. How are we to go about increas- 

 ing our yield of corn? 



I want to talk to you, first, about the preparation ; second, the cultivation ; 

 and third, the harvesting of the corn crop. 



In discussing this subject, I do so with a view to increasing the yield first, 

 and then with the purpose of handling the corn crop more economically than 

 we are accustomed to do. 



I want to urge the farmers to quit patching. You need to get your fields 

 for corn as large as conditions will permit; get the gullies, the brier-thickets, 

 and clumps of bushes out. Good-size fields are necessary for economical culti- 

 vation. The great majority of the cornfields we see are suffering for something. 

 See the many little patches of sickly-yellow corn that will not pay for its culti- 

 vation. What is the matter? It is simply starved for the want of proper 

 food. Corn must have proper food and water to give good results, just as 

 animals. Deep plowing is absolutely necessary. A deep-plowed soil is the 

 storeroom of food for the corn plant, as much so as the granary is the store- 

 room for food for the animals. A deep-plowed soil not only holds the moist- 

 ure, but it acts also as a drainage, permitting the water to soak into the land, 

 and not stand on the surface around the roots of the corn. But deep plowing 

 alone will be a failure. You must practice such a system of rotation as to 

 be continually putting plant food in the soil, by growing leguminous crops- 

 such as peas, red and crimson clover ; by keeping live stock, by sowing grasses, 

 and running live stock on your land— any system that will add humus or de- 

 cayed vegetable matter. If you want the very best results use stable manure. 

 These leguminous crops not only draw nitrogen from the air and store it in 

 the soil, but their decaying in the soil acts as an absorbent, and holds the 

 water and keeps the soil moist and waters the corn plant as it needs it. 

 Deep plowing, stable manure and leguminous crops, then, are absolutely nec- 

 essary. A farmer who plants a field of corn should give the land such treat- 

 ment that he would have the right to expect a larger yield of corn on account 

 of that treatment. Unless a person so treats his land he is not worthy of the 

 name of a farmer. Unless he complies with some of these conditions he will 

 fail on his corn crop, no matter what implements he uses, or how he cultivates 

 his corn, or what kind of seed he uses. 



SEED SELECTION. 



The farmer should give more attention to improving his seed. The best 

 way is to go over your field before you cut or pull your corn and select the 

 stalk that has two good ears, and from a stalk that comes nearest coming up 

 to your ideal of what a cornstalk ought to be. By following this simple 

 method you will improve your field of corn. Of course, after shucking this 

 corn you should select only the best type of ear. An excellent plan is to take 

 a few of these best ears and plant to themselves, where you can look after it 

 more closely than if in a large field. Any farmer can follow this plan. Se- 

 lecting from the crib may give you a good ear, but you can't tell the parent of 

 that ear. whether the stalk had one ear or two, or was a large, overgrown 

 plant, nut of proportion to the ear. It is a mistake to get seed from a dis- 

 tance, that is grown in a different climate and under different conditions from 

 ours. A corn planter should be used, because it saves labor and plants the 

 corn at a uniform distance and depth, and corn will come up better after a 

 planter than it will dropped by hand. It is easy to get corn too thick, and 

 much labor can be saved by having the planter drop the corn at the right dis- 

 tance and putting the right number of grains in a hill. I think one is suffi- 

 cient, ordinarily. If you have complied with the first condition of having a 

 good seedbed, all thai is necessary in the cultivation is to stir the soil so as to 

 keep down the grass, kill young weeds and preserve the moisture. The first 

 working (which should be early after the corn is planted, and certainly as 



