164 KNAPP METHOD OF GROWING COTTON 



exhausted than to preserve the fertility of 

 the soil. The logical result of such a system was 

 the wearing out of the most desirable lands. 



Any system of cropping which does not 

 return to the land the larger part of all that is 

 grown on it, either in the shape of manure from 

 live stock or by turning under the green crops, 

 will soon result in unproductive soils. In 

 some places, cotton has been grown on the 

 same land for generations. This soil was 

 evidently very fertile in the beginning or it 

 would be so exhausted by now that it would not 

 produce profitable crops. 



Dr. B. T. Galloway, Chief of the Bureau 

 of Plant Industry, once said, after visiting 

 the Cotton States, that "When the Southern 

 farmer learned to diversify and feed his soil 

 by returning to it what it produced, a system 

 of land robbing would give way to a system of 

 land building." 



If only the lint were sold from the cotton farm, 

 less fertility would be removed by it than any 

 other crop known. By returning the seeds or 

 their equivalent in manure or fertilizer, with 

 all the other parts of the plant, there should be 

 little soil deterioration from cotton farming. 



