126 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 



and on the other removes increased competition and the probability 

 of an over-production of livestock. It should not be forgotten that live- 

 stock husbandry is the most important factor in the corn market. As 

 nearly as can be estimated, eighty per cent of the corn produced in the 

 United States is fed to livestock. Then, too, there are large areas where 

 the production of livestock will long prove not only the most profitable 

 but also practically the only use which can be made of these lands. 

 This is a fact which should not be overlooked in any effort looking to- 

 ward the development of all agricultural resources. Intelligent systems of 

 livestock production are feasible and profitable not only on lands not 

 adapted for grain growing, but upon lands especially suited to grain 

 growing. If, therefore, an individual adopts a system of exclusive grain 

 farming, he does so from choice, or seeming necessity, and not because 

 systems of livestock farming are not profitable. 



3. The keeping of more and better livestock on the -farm promotes 

 greater interest in farm life. The tendency for the boys and girls, the 

 young men and the young women, to early leave the farm is a tendency 

 which is universally regretted. I venture to say that no single agricultur- 

 al reconstruction would increase this tendency more certainly and more 

 rapidly than a general abandonment of livestock husbandry. In other 

 words, eliminate livestock as an important factor in agricultural practice, 

 and you remove forever the most powerful magnet that attracts and holds 

 the brightest and best among our farm-raised young men and young 

 women. An agriculture without livestock is threatened with becoming a 

 business prosecuted by a relatively ignorant class who are not farmers 

 from choice, but because it furnishes as remunerative employment for 

 the laboring man as factory, shop or mine. Do we wish nothing better 

 for American agriculture? 



4. If advocates of a system of livestock husbandry could put forth no 

 stronger argument than that it encourages, and, speaking broadly, neces- 

 sitates the residence of the owner of the farm on the farm, it would in- 

 deed be sufficient. I take it that we are interested in the ultimate status 

 of the farmer as a class, as well as the financial possibilities of land own- 

 ership. It is a deplorable condition in the trend of the agricultural prac- 

 tice of a state when intelligent and successful farmers forsake their 

 farm homes for town or city, while their farms pass to the control of ten- 

 ants, whose chief interest is in mining the soil, and who seldom care 

 for the best development of country life.* 



5. The highest type of agriculture is not possible without livestock. 

 If the highest type of intelligent citizenship is to prevail in this country, 

 it will rest largely upon the possibility of developing standards of liv- 



*The writer does not wish to be understood as even intimating that all 

 tenants are undesirable citizens. As a matter of fact, there are tenants in Illinois, 

 who, if left to themselves,- would better care for the farms they occupy than the 

 owners. It is highly desirable that since a certain per cent of Illinois farms must 

 be occupied by tenants that some serious attention be given to developing tenants 

 who shall be a credit to agriculture, as they are in Great Britain, and not a re- 

 proach, as is frequently the case in this country. Lengthening the term of lease 

 will help materially. 



