LAND AND OTHER NATURAL AGENTS 13 



34. Whose interests should be kept in mind in making a conser- 

 vation program, those of present consumers of agricultural products 

 or those of the future ? Present or future producers ? Can we recon- 

 cile the interests of all these classes ? 



35. Were the pioneers who homes teaded the Mississippi Valley 

 conservationists ? Were they enemies of the people ? Was their 

 profit others' loss ? Whose ? Have they any defense ? 



36. Can you point out some sort of exploitative agriculture which 

 is economically justifiable ? some which is not ? 



37. Is the careful farming of rocky hillsides (even conceivably 

 increasing their fertility) true conservation ? What would be ? 

 Extend this to apply to all the varieties of land in the United States. 



38. Is there reason to suppose that, having taken the cheap road 

 to agricultural production in the past, we shall find new sources of 

 cheap fertility in the future ? Explain several prospects. 



39. Does it seem likely that numerous changes in the arts will 

 in the future tend to enlarge the agricultural powers of land ? Men- 

 tion several. 



PROBLEMS 



1. A lecturer said: "Few people realize that Australia contains 

 an area larger than the United States. If you do not find suitable 

 opportunities here, come out to Australia. " Even granting the 

 accuracy of his figures, is physical area of the two countries a fair 

 basis of comparison of their agricultural resources in land ? Are the 

 United States and Canada comparable in this way? Why? The 

 United States and Mexico ? Europe ? 



2. "A fact which distinguishes agriculture from all other industries 

 is its dependence upon land. A manufacturing or mercantile estab- 

 lishment can economize land surface by building up into the air; a 

 mine needs land surface only as a means of getting access to the 

 mineral deposit beneath. But, no matter how deep the soil or how 

 rich the deposit of plant food in a given area may be, there is a limit 

 to the number of plants that can grow on that area, and therefore 

 the product of that area does not depend exclusively upon the depth 

 and richness of the deposit; it depends quite as much upon the size 

 of the area." Is this a peculiarity of land as a factor in agricultural 

 production ? Does the thinness of a soil layer sometimes become a 

 limiting factor ? Did you ever hear of " two-story farming" ? How 

 deep does a deep-tillage machine make the soil available ? May we 

 go deeper in the future? Only very little manufacturing and mer- 

 cantile business runs more than ten stories high. Is it likely that 

 deep tillage, artificial fertilization, and the like will give us ten-story 

 agriculture ? How high will cities be then ? 



