132 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



grandeur, however, is more than compensated for in the quiet charm of our 

 rock-walled river valleys and other erosion forms of the driftless area; in the 

 beauty of our clear crystal lakes nestling among morainic hills; in the hope 

 and joy inspired by fertile plains loaded with bounteous harvests and 

 stretching on in endless vistas to the far horizon; in all the evidences of 

 peace, comfort, intelligence, wealth and prosperity which everywhere abound 

 within our borders. The uniformity of the surface of our state, and the 

 physical agencies which produced this uniformity, are to be reckoned 

 among the fundamental causes of Iowa's marvelous succe.-s, a success 

 which states of more rugged topographic forms could not possibly attain. 

 But a full discussion of the causes of the physical features of Iowa, and 

 their consequences in connection with the progress and development of her 

 people, while making an interesting chapter, would make one too long for 

 our present purpose. 



IOWA CLIMATE AND CROPS. 



Iowa easily holds the foremost place among agricultural states. Statis- 

 tics of its soil products and live stock industry justify this claim, and a care- 

 ful study of climatic records and vast resources of soil fertility will reveal the 

 cause of its primacy in agriculture. Its location within the greatest corn- 

 producing area in this country or the world is especially favorable. In fact, 

 it may be claimed without exaggeration that Iowa constitutes the most pro- 

 ductive portion of the far-famed corn belt of America; the statistical records 

 of the past thirteen years will sustain it. The distinctive feature of this state 

 is the fact that about 95 per cent of its area may be made to produce some- 

 thing of value. And fully 90 per cent of its surface is exceedingly rich in 

 the elements of plant growth. In a paper entitled "What Glaciers have 

 done for Iowa," Professor Calvin wrote as follows concerning the value of 

 its soils: 



The soils of Iowa have a value equal to all the gold and silver mines of 

 the world combined. In fact it is difficult to find sources of wealth with 

 which our soils may properly be compared. And for all this rich heritage of 

 soils we are indebted to great rivers of ice that overflowed Iowa from the north 

 and northwest. Tr.e glaciers in their long journey ground up the rocks 

 over which they moved and mingled the fresh rock flour, derived from 

 granites and other crystalline rocks of Brit'sh America and northern Minne- 

 sota with pulverized limestones and shales of more southern regions, and 

 used these rich materials in covering up the bald rocks and leveling the 

 irregular surface of preglacial Iowa. The materials are, in places, hundreds 

 of feet in depth. They are not oxidized or leached, but retain the carbon- 

 ates and other soluble constituents tnat contribute so largely to the growth 

 of plants. The physical condition of the materials is ideal, rendering the 

 soil porous, facilitating the distribution of moisture, and offering unmatched 

 opportunities for the employment of improved machinery in all the pro- 

 cesses connected with cultivation. 



In their appointed time those ancient glaciers wrought well in preparing 

 the material and overspreading the rocky valley with drift. That formative 

 period in earth-building was succeeded by more genial climatic conditions, 

 with alternations of wet and dry seasons like those of recent years, with 

 fervent heat of summer and intense cold of winter, producing growth and 

 decay of vegetation for unnumbered thousands of centuries, and transform- 



