THIRD ANNUAL YEAR BOOK — PART II. 55 



that lies at the foundation of all our prosperity and that nobody has 

 given attention to these things. I wish we had the data that has 

 been gathered at the agricultural college since September, in regard 

 to corn. We have sent out a thousand letters asking for the variety 

 of corn, and a great majority of answers that have come in give, 

 "corn, without any name; com, without any particular variety; 

 mixed corn" ; showing that there has been no attention paid to 

 these things. I know from my experience in Illinois that two- 

 thirds or three-quarters of the people are just growing com ; that 

 is all ; just as though they had picked up a dog, no difference what 

 he was, while they wanted a Shepherd dog, and find out it is noth- 

 ing but a pug-nosed dog. Very great improvement could be 

 made. Where we now grow thirty to fifty bushels to the acre 

 it is just as possible for every farmer to grow forty-five to sixty 

 with the soil that we have. This year on these farms where this 

 corn was selected, as I have before said, on this seven thousand 

 acres, there is fifteen hundred acres of it growing over one hun- 

 dred bushels to the acre. Think of it. It would amount to a 

 great deal of corn ; one hundred and fifty thousand bushels every 

 year; and you know what that means to grow. 



Chairman : The next on the program is a paper by H. O. Wal- 

 lace, entitled, " Winter Wheat Growing in Iowa." 



WINTER WHEAT GROWING IN IOWA. 



H. C. Wallace, Associate Editor Wallaces' Farmer, Des Moines, Iowa. 

 It is most difficult to secure with any degree of satisfaction reliable 

 statistics covering the production of winter wheat in Iowa during the 

 past twenty-five years. The government reports do not separate the 

 winter wheat from the spring. The only figures available are those be- 

 ginning with the year 1892, and collected by the State Agricultural So- 

 ciety, and the accuracy of these figures, for several years at least, is 

 open to serious question. However, they are the only figures we have 

 and we must use them for what they are worth. According to the best 

 available statistics, the acreage of winter wheat in Iowa for the year 

 1892 was 235,000 acres. It decreased steadily but slowly until the year 

 1898, when there were 191,451 acres. The next winter was a most dis- 

 astrous one on the winter wheat crop and in 1899 but 27,427 acres were 

 harvested. In the neighborhood of 200,000 acres were grown annu- 

 ally up to that time, this winter proved a permanent backset to this 

 crop, for in 1900 but 76;080 acres were harvested, and in 1901 but 49,068 



