192 THE BUSINESS OF FAKMING 



utilized as food for stock or from which a fair 

 quantity of cane sugar can be procured. 



Now, the author can see no objection to the 

 utilization of the cornstalk into paper making, 

 provided our soils are supplied with organic mat- 

 ter from some source other than the cornstalks. 

 Otherwise the cornstalk should never be destroyed 

 by fire or taken from the farm. We must not get 

 away from the living truth that our soils' sorest 

 need is organic matter. Certain death and decay 

 is written upon their every fiber if organic matter 

 in abundance is not each year restored to them. 

 But in the removal of the cornstalk from the 

 farm we are not wholly without a substitute from 

 which vast quantities of organic matter can be 

 quickly obtained. If, when we lay by our corn 

 fields we would sow them to rye or vetch, we would 

 not only give these soils the finest cover crop, but 

 would give to them before plowing time the fol- 

 lowing spring more organic matter than the corn- 

 stalks would afford. But do not forget that these 

 cornstalks removed from the farm, remove a 

 large quantity of the mineral elements they ex- 

 tract from the soil in their growth, which will be 

 forever lost to the soil, and mineral elements that 

 soil must have to make it fertile. 



The utilization of cornstalks by shredding is to 

 be commended although this method does not fur- 

 nish one-half the feed that is furnished by the silo, 

 yet it prevents the waste of the cornstalks, be- 

 cause those portions of the shredded stalks not 

 eaten, and which can not be eaten by stock, may be 

 utilized in bedding for stock, and is thus con- 

 served into manure. And as these shredded 



