504 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 
comes to the state fair because of its educational value and does not 
begrudge the money spent in this way; but vs^hen times are hard with 
him and money not as plentiful as usual he does not spend it on trips 
of this sort. If our eastern friends know how to read the signs of the 
great agricultural country of the central west they Y>dll cheer up when 
they hear of the record-breaking success of the Iowa State Fair. It 
should be a good luck sign to them. If the attendance this year had 
fallen below last year conservative men would have regarded it as a 
warning to move cautiously. We may have financial troubles in dif- 
ferent sections, but the real prosperity of the country depends upon 
the farmer, and as long as he feels comfortable over the situation there 
is no reason for general alarm. The attendance at the Iowa State 
Fair is a good financial barometer. 
The principal event of Wednesday was the visit of Secretary of 
Agriculture Wilson and his address before a very large audience. We 
can not publish this address for the reason that Secretary Wilson had 
not reduced it to manuscript. He dealt with agricultural matters en- 
tirely. He told something of the work that is being done by his 
department. Speaking of the fertility of our farm lands, he said 
that some time since one of the industrial commissions appointed by 
the president had asked the Department of Agriculture for statistics 
on this subject, and to get at the facts he had some of the department 
staff make a careful investigation into the yield of crops for the past 
forty years. He said that this investigation showed very clearly that 
while there had been some variations, yet the last ten years of the 
forty had given larger yields per acre than any other ten-year period. 
He did not know of any other way to answer the question as to the 
fertility of our land better than by the yield of crops per acre. Tie 
said there is no need of the Iowa farmer bothering his head about 
commercial fertilizers if he will simply follow the common sense of 
rotation. Grow grass, pasture it, plow it up and grov/ corn, feed the 
corn, stalks and all, to the live stock on the farm, return the manure 
to the land — that is the secret of keeping up the fertility and increasing 
the crop yield. On his own farm in Tama county crops had never 
yielded so well as during recent years. The land is increasing in fer- 
tility instead of deteriorating. An acre of corn fodder is worth as 
much as stock feed as an acre of timothy hay. Don't grow the timothy 
hay at all. Cut up the corn, husk out the ears and feed the fodder. 
The farmers of Iowa are losing $40,000,000 a year in not saving their 
corn fodder. Of course, they can stand it if anyone can. But if the 
time comes when they want to make a little extra money, just save the 
corn fodder. 
On the subject of tuberculosis he said that it was becoming more 
and more serious. Some European countries were now asking that the 
Department of Agriculture certify that the meat sent to them is from 
animals which had not been affected with tuberculosis. Meat inspection 
in the United States is more rigid than in any other country in the 
