I3 o CONSERVATION 



fifty state and territorial departments of ed at 708 establishments in 186 cities 



agriculture, the stock breeders' associa- and towns and covered 50,999,034 



tions, the sanitary offices in charge of animals. Imagine 50,000,000 animals! 



live-stock interests, the horticultural Picture them lined up, ten feet allowed 



and kindred societies, the state high- for each ! The line would reach almost 



way offices and the like. four times around the world. 



But let us turn to the department The Bureau of Chemistry alone is 



proper. worth to the country far more than the 



Here is a Weather Bureau, foretell- entire cost of the Agricultural Depart- 

 ing frosts, storms and floods; and by ment. In the protection of the public 

 signals, bulletins and mail and tele- health against unwholesome foods, 

 phone service, informing the people through the enforcement of the act of 

 that they may protect their interests. June 30, 1906, it is rendering a price- 



A Bureau of Soils has surveyed and less service. More than twenty years 



mapped 147,107 square miles of land ago, when sugar beet culture in the 



in forty-seven states and territories. United States was infantile, the chief 



It studies methods of improving soils of the bureau indicated the areas in 



and rendering them most productive. which that plant would thrive. In the 



The Bureau of Plant Industry inves- nine years ending with 1907, the value 



tigates the best methods of farm man- of its product increased by 543 per 



agement, of crop rotation and the se- cent., and amounted to $45,000,000 



lection of soils ; it studies plant diseases almost four times as much as the en- 



and methods of combating them. It tire appropriation for the Department 



seeks to improve the grade of corn, in 1907. The sugar beet farms and 



wheat, etc., by breeding, as the grade factories in the United States were 



of stock is improved by breeding. For worth, in the same year, $60,000,000. 



certain crops, it restores wasted soils Between 1900 and 1905 the acre value 



by drawing nitrogen from the air and of such farms of medium sort increased 



making it available to plants as food, from $99.47 to $141.96, a gain of 



It ransacks the planet for plants which $42.49. 



will meet American needs. Blackber- Insect pests annually consume and 



ries and currants have been imported destroy in the United States values be- 



from Northern Korea, and apples yond estimate. The "vegetable bugs" 



from Northern Manchuria ; a collection alone lay upon the farmer an annual 



of twenty-four pears from North tax greater than that involved in the 



China, while bush cherries, plums and maintenance of the entire United States 



peaches have come from Northern government. Against such pests, the 



Siberia. From Russia and Africa was Bureau of Entomology wages a relent- 



brought the durum wheat for dry land less and unceasing war. It is estimated 



culture. At an initial cost of $10,000 that this bureau saves the farmer in 



this now produces a crop worth $30,- some s i ng i e years f rom $300,000,000 to 



000,000. in regions where once "the $400 ooo ooo 



steer roamed over twenty acres to find Eyen [ Q outHne all the WQrk of this 



his hvmg/ : An Arabian alfalfa yields department would far exceed the 



from seven to twelve cutting, per -year. j imi Qf ^ The Forest Servicg( 



I he Bureau of Animal Industry . . ... /, , 



, ,, -,, i i r i with which the readers of CONSERVA- 



seeks to cure the ills to which live-stock . 



is heir. Of these, Texas fever is a type. TION are so ^miliar, is but one of its 



Its cause is traced to a tick ; its cure, to ""merous bureaus. But mention must 



the destruction of this parasite by meth- be made of the publicity feature. This 



ods wholly practicable, as dipping, department runs a great publishing 



spraying and the like. This bureau in- house, sending to the farmers, in com- 



spects meat under the law of June 30, pact form, the specific information 



1906. In 1907, inspection was conduct- they need in their business. In 1907, 



