FIFTEENTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK— PART IV 297 



in the near future to make it nossible for a greater number of farmers 

 to attend first-class fairs and thus get in closer touch with the big busi- 

 ness of farming and stock raising. 



It was a pleasure to pass from barn to barn this year and see the 

 large number of cattle, horses, swine, and sheep on exhibition. It was, 

 indeed a pleasure to see the high quality so manifest on every hand. The 

 live stock exhibits at any state fair, and particularly at the Des Moines 

 fair, are a fair index to the live stock activity throughout the state as 

 well as in states adjoining, and this year's exhibition certainly showed 

 that more interest is now being taken in live stock, especially in the 

 breeding of good cattle, than ever before because there were more exhi- 

 bitors, many of whom were new Iowa breeders. Small herds are being 

 started all over the state because people are beginning to wake up to 

 the fact that there is not only a scarcity of cattle throughout the United 

 States and in foreign countries as well, but also owing to the high price 

 of our land better cattle will from now on become an absolute necessity 

 if stock raising and stock feeding are to remain profitable. Scrub cattle 

 can not be profitably fattened on 70-cent corn and $12 hay, nor can such 

 cattle pay interest on- land worth from $150 to $250 an acre. We repeat, 

 therefore, that it was a great pleasure to see that this sentiment was 

 reflected on the fair grounds. 



The Iowa State College is becoming a factor of increasing interest 

 and importance on the fair grounds from year to year. Its exhibits are, 

 of course, all educational, but that is not all. They are exceedingly 

 practical and appeal strongly to the more up-to-date farmers. It is true 

 that the college exhibits should be studied with greater care than they 

 are, but they are comparatively new and it takes a long time to get 

 the average farmer to take hold of new things. We trust that in the 

 future these college exhibits will be studied more carefully, for the 

 lessons they teach are invaluable. In one department of the college 

 building there was an exhibit of lime and various commercial fertilizers. 

 The young men in charge explained what kind of soils are in need of 

 lime and how to determine v/hen they are. They showed how a soil may 

 be tested with litmus paper; that an acid soil turns blue litmus paper 

 red, while one that is not acid does not change the color of the paper 

 at all. Tests of that sort Avere made in the college building and farmers 

 were shown how to discriminate between very acid and slightly acid soils 

 and how much lime to add to overcome various degrees of acidity. Such 

 fertilizers as raw rock phosphate, acid phosphate, kanit, nitrate of soda, 

 and sulphate of ammonia, were shown and their uses explained. The 

 average farmer does not realize that commercial fertilizers have a place 

 in Iowa, yet the time is at hand when the yielding capacity of a con- 

 siderable amount of Iowa land can be profitably increased by the judi- 

 cious use of fertilizers in connection with barnyard manure and the 

 plowing under of green crops. 



