tion. In such a pass the farmer looks about him for fcome means of devoting a field 

 or two to paying purposes that will relieve him of labour responsibilities, especially 

 at harvest time. From this motive many contracts for flax rentals have been made. 



Spring ploughing the second year after sod frequently discloses a potential 

 scourge of wire worms. The fanner knows that a cereal crop would go down before the 

 pest. He learns that flax is practically immune from attacks of the wire worm. 



Such influences as the above are outside any ordinary system of farming that has 

 to do with crop rotation. As a matter of fact, Ontario farmers, unlike their European 

 brethren, have never planned to keep flax as a permanent crop. One reason for this 

 has been the lack of .a well-organized system of up-to-date mills. Without millb, 

 operated either by co-operation among farmers, or by separate interests, there is no 

 market for flax, just as without sugar factories there can be no demand for sugar beets, 

 but the reasons for the farmer's lack of .attention to fibre flax are chiefly the follow- 

 ing: 



(a) Flax is supposed to impoverish the soil. 



, ; (&) Nothing is returned to the land, either in the way of stubble or as 



manure. 



(c) Flax is vexatious in the matter of harvesting, it being the tradition 

 that fibre flax must be harvested by pulling. 



THE FLAX FIELD ITS CHOICE AND CULTIVATION. 



IS FLAX UNDULY HARD ON THE SOIL? 



On the first of these objections, which dates back at least two thousand years, 

 there is a great deal to be said. On the whole, we are inclined to accept the reports 

 of scientific investigators rather than traditional opinion. Below are given tables 

 prepared to show the mineral requirements of both seed flax and fibre flax. The former 

 is from a bulletin by Prof. H. L. Bolley, of the University of North Dakota, the latter 

 from one issued by the Dominion Department of Agriculture. 



COMPARATIVE DRAFT on the Soil by Seed Flax and other Crops. 

 TABLE A. 



