542 IO\YA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 



SUMMABY. 



(1) Habit frequently continues a type of farming in a community long 

 after that type has become unprofitable. 



(2) Changes in the farm system are often deferred (1) because of 

 lack of knowledge of how to replan the farm, (2) because of lack of 

 funds in carrying out new plans, (3) because new fences, buildings, or 

 equipment are called for in the new plan, and (4) because a change fre- 

 quently requires a readjustment of many of the usual ways of thinking 

 and doing. 



(3) In replanning the farm, help may be obtained from visits to suc- 

 cessful farms, from farm literature, agricultural papers, the State expe- 

 riment stations, the agricultural colleges, the United States Department 

 of Agriculture, and from agricultural experts. 



(4) The farm can be as successfully planned as other businesses are, 

 provided the plans are made to cover average conditions over a period of 

 years. 



(5) Profitable farming results from good farm plans comprehending 

 every feature of the farm carefully co-ordinated and effectually carried 

 out. 



(6) A good farm plan provides for (1) a reasonable reward for the 

 capital and labor invested and (2) the maintenance or increase of soil 

 fertility, and (3) it must be within the comprehension and ability of the 

 owner to carry out. 



(7) The income from the same farm can often be doubled or trebled 

 without increased expense by adopting a system of farming suited to the 

 land, the locality, and the owner. 



(8) The successful replanning of a farm rests on a comprehensive 

 knowledge of agriculture gained by experience and by familiarity with 

 what is being accomplished by others along agricultural lines, either as 

 observed by personal visits or as recorded in the literature of agriculture. 



SOIL CONSERVATION. 



U. S. Department of Agriculture, Farmers Bulletin 406. 



IXTKODUCTIOX. 



How to restore and maintain the productivity of the soil is the most 

 important phase of the conservation problem. "We are no longer a new 

 nation. We have deluded ourselves with the idea that we have unbounded 

 resources in land, in forests, in mineral wealth. We have been prodigal 

 in the utilization of these resources. We must now pay the penalty of 

 this prodigality. In many of our older communities soil fertility has been 

 reduced below the point of profitable production. Nation-wide effort at 

 the present time, through federal and state agency, is directed toward the 

 restoration of fertility in these localities. On the prairies of the West 

 fertility is beginning to wane. In order that our heritage in the prairie 



