THE ADVANTAGES FROM CAPITAL 97 



for agriculture, which are as certain to be settled in small 

 farms as were the lands of Illinois. 



Land that was thought to be absolute desert has been 

 made to yield heavy crops of grain and forage by this method 

 without irrigation. 



Macaroni wheat will grow with ten inches of rainfall, 

 and yield fifteen bushels to the acre. This however is less 

 than the average wheat yield in the United States. 



Much can be done by dry fanning ; that is, by plowing the 

 soil very deep and cultivating six or eight times a season, 

 thus retaining all the moisture for the crops and reducing 

 evaporation to a minimum. 



There are thousands of acres in different sections of Mon- 

 tana that grow good crops without irrigation. In Fergus 

 County, for instance, the wonderful yield of 45 bushels of 

 wheat per acre is grown without irrigation. Heavy crops 

 of grain and vegetables are grown in the vicinity of Great 

 Falls by the dry farming system. 



The money and time spent in spraying is also well in- 

 vested. The New York Agricultural Experiment Station 

 began a ten-year experiment in potato-spraying to determine 

 how much the yield can be increased by spraying with 

 Pyrox or with Bordeaux mixture. 



In 1904 the gain due to spraying was larger than ever 

 before. Five sprayings with Bordeaux increased the yield 

 233 bushels per acre, while three sprayings increased it 191 

 bushels. The gain was due chiefly to the prolongation of 

 growth through the prevention of late blight. The sprayed 

 potatoes contained one ninth more starch and were of better 

 quality. 



The average increase of profit per acre from spraying 

 potatoes was figured to be about $22 on each acre. The 

 H 



