CHAPTER I 



Good Soils Back of Good Crops 



The soils of the United States are as diverse as 

 the people that live on them. They vary greatly 

 in origin, in composition and in productive power. 

 They are subject to change, and respond to good 

 treatment or suffer from inattention or neglect. 

 On every side even a casual observer sees soils 

 that once abounded in fertility, but are now so 

 depleted that they barely pay the cost of seed and 

 tillage. Other soils, that inherited poverty through 

 generations of thriftless ownership, are now known 

 for their high productive power. 



THE SUPREME TEST OF THE FARMER 



Ability to make soil produce is the test of good 

 farming. Without this ability, ideal climate, favor- 

 able situation and propitious seasons are of little 

 agricultural value. The good farmer makes every 

 kind of soil do his will and become fertile. There 

 is no soil, whether it be the granite soil of New 

 England, the red clay lands of the south, the sandy 

 soils of the coastal plains, the limestone lands of 

 the Middle West, the deep vegetable soils of the 

 prairie states or the black lands of the Southwest, 

 that will not become more productive in the hands 

 of an intelligent and industrious man. 



If the kind of soil is not the paramount object of 

 consideration in trying to make farming pay, what 

 then is the vital consideration? It is this: knowl- 

 edge of the soil and its management. We must 



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