Missouri State Dairy Association. 403 



hays that he is required to feed. These facts must receive 

 their proper consideration. 



Much has been written about the Hosmer farm in Webster 

 county, Missouri, which is an example of the role played by 

 the dairy cow in building up a farm. Twenty years ago Mr. 

 Hosmer bought a farm that had long been under cultivation. 

 It was located on the stage line that once ran from Rolla to 

 Springfield, and was used as a station on this line. The farm 

 was naturally a good farm for that part of the country, but 

 grain had been grown on it continuously for many years and 

 fed to stage horses or sold off the farm. It would hardly pro- 

 duce five bushels of wheat to the acre, and a yield of fifteen 

 bushels of corn to the acre was considered excellent. 



When the farm was bought Mr. Hosmer commenced 

 milking cows and making butter, and his son, who now has 

 charge of the farm, still continues this. The fertility of the soil 

 has been increased to the point where a fair season assures a 

 yield of from 25 to 30 bushels of wheat to the acre. The yield 

 of corn averages 60 bushels to the acres. On good years large 

 fields have averaged 85 bushels to the acre, and one particularly 

 favorable season a ten-acre field yielded by actual weight in 

 round numbers 1,000 bushels of corn. Alfalfa has been grown 

 successfully on practically every field of the farm. Mr. Hosmer 

 has repeatedly stated that all this was made possible because 

 they fed most of the crops grown on the farm to the dairy cow. 

 What crops they did sell they replaced with concentrated feeds 

 that were rich in soil fertility. 



This farm is by no means the only one in the south part 

 of Missouri where remarkable results have been achieved. 

 N. P. Jacobsen of Seymour has a forty-acre farm on which he 

 raises alfalfa and clover in abundance. He never gets less than 

 60 bushels of oats to the acre and is disappointed when this 

 wheat does not average 30 bushels to the acre. The writer 

 personally has seen his corn shuck out at the rate of 65 bushels 

 to the acre when his neighbors informed him that they were 

 getting fifteen. The reason for this is that Mr. Jacobsen keeps 

 about twelve cows on his farm, has a silo and saves the manure 

 produced by his cows. His neighbors have not yet learned 

 to believe in cows. 



It does not always take a long time for the effect of the 

 dairy cow on the soil fertility to be seen. Mr. R. C. Zeller of 

 Seymour, Mo., bought a farm within a mile of that town in 



