teria. Floating in the atmosphere and resting in the soil and 

 other materials are dried bodies of plants mingled with which 

 are forms of animal life infusoria. These and similar or- 

 ganisms become activated in the presence of water, if it is 

 correct in quantity and quality. The end result is aquatic 

 vegetation that is food for fish and fowl, the farmer's water 

 crop. After the pond is drained in the rotation plan, the 

 aquatic vegetation is greedily pastured by the farm animals, 

 while the protein material left behind, including the unutil- 

 ized bodies of fishes and aquatic animals, becomes trans- 

 formed into manure for the following grain crop. Because 

 of the regulated biological action incident to the rotation, 

 these ponds are generally free from malaria. 



Under favorable natural conditions generally, equal areas 

 yield comparable profits from both land and water farming, 

 and thus are reduced the natural hazards in farm practice. 



[c] SMALL DRAINAGE AREAS. 



As an illustration of what may be undertaken for erosion 

 control and water conservation on the scale of an entire small 

 valley, the "adventure in cooperative conservation" of Coon 

 Creek Valley, in west-central Wisconsin near La Crosse, is 

 illuminating. One of the first demonstration areas of the 

 United States Soil Erosion Service, now the Soil Conservation 

 Service, was the Coon Creek Project. 13 



The Coon Valley is one of the innumerable little headwater 

 units which make up the great Mississippi River system. A 

 valley of scenic hills, excellent soils and rich grasses in the 

 clearings, its major agricultural contribution to the national 

 income has been, at first wheat, but more recently prin- 

 cipally butterfat and tobacco. 



When settlement and the development of its agriculture 

 began about 1850 everything was all right because there 

 were more hills and trees and sods than farms and animals. 

 There was a rich cover of humus, built up through centuries; 

 the streams ran clear, deep, narrow and full, and were filled 

 with trout; the streams seldom overflowed (the first known 

 flood was in 1873), and the early settlers often stacked their 



13 This section generally an adaptation of Aldo Leopold's Coon Valley, in American 

 Forests, May 1935. 



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