1 08 READINGS IN RURAL ECONOMICS 



Crop possibilities. There are many ways in which it is possi- 

 ble to increase crops. There is much good land that is not now 

 being used, but that will be used as soon as prices make it worth 

 while. The use of more fertilizers, the better use of manure, and 

 other methods of more careful farming are rapidly coming in as 

 prices make it worth while. 



There are millions of acres of good farm land in swamps, which 

 we will farm as soon as we are convinced that it will pay to drain 

 them. Shaler estimates that there are 3,000,000 acres of reclaim- 

 able seacoast marshland along the Atlantic coast of the United 

 States. 



There are other millions of acres on farms, made up of smaller 

 areas from fractions of acres to large marshes, which are gradually 

 being reclaimed. On the vast majority of American farms there 

 are areas of land that can be brought into cultivation when prices 

 warrant the work. In total, this is far more important than re- 

 claiming the large swamps. 



The writer made a study of 13 farms, containing 1060 acres, 

 near Ithaca. On these farms nearly 210 acres of land are still in 

 woods or stumps that will make excellent farm land when cleared. 

 This land is just as good as any of the present cleared land. This 

 is in addition to woodland that must be kept permanently in 

 woods. During the past three years, on these farms, 17 acres of 

 previously waste wet land and 63 acres of woodland have been 

 turned into pasture, and 44 acres of pasture land and 7 acres of 

 previously waste land have been taken for crops. This example is 

 typical of the state. Probably more brush lines along fences and 

 wet places have been reclaimed in New York in the last five years 

 than in the preceding twenty-five years. Prices in New York are 

 usually not high enough to justify one in clearing land all at once, 

 but woodland and brush-land can be turned into pasture and be 

 ready to clear cheaply in about twenty years, after the stumps have 

 partly rotted. In this way the saving in cost of clearing may equal 

 the value as pasture, and the two usually pay better than clearing 

 at once by expensive methods. 



The above conditions are typical not only of New York, but 

 also of most of the farms in the eastern states. At the same 



