No. 4.] DAIRYING. 73 



their work better. Go where you will, the people are talking 

 apples, aud about the Hood Kivcr Valley organization. In 

 my opinion, if the business would put the same organized 

 ability, care and skill into dairying, we should find in a dec- 

 ade or two that it would offer just as great opportunities as 

 the apple business, because it is necessary to have milk, and 

 it is not necessary to have apples. Set apple trees, but set the 

 right sort of cows, also. 



Now, to go back to the method of growing oats, and peas, 

 and alfalfa, and other crops of that sort, and taking the cows 

 off the pasture system. I wish that pasturing could be 

 banished from the earth; it just means that we expect to get 

 something, and do not get it. I wish every man who depends 

 on pasturing would next year fence off a square rod in his 

 pasture, where the best feed grows, and then watch to see how 

 much feed grows in that pasture. If it is anything like our 

 pastures, you would wonder what the cow eats to make milk 

 of. The pastures in the east as a whole have gone, in my 

 opinion, never to return. I doubt whether we shall ever be 

 able to establish pastures like those of England, because of 

 our climate. We certainly shall not so long as cows are per- 

 mitted to graze the pastures until there is nothing left; for 

 that means the production of a plant that will stand that 

 kind of grazing, and the plants that will stand it are the ones 

 that have a very small, meager growth. I tried the experi- 

 ment of fencing off a plot in the pasture, and it changed my 

 method. I thought there was a good deal growing there, 

 but the cows did not, and they were right. 



What shall we do to make our lands better worth while ? 

 We are saving our stable manure, and taking care of it quite 

 well. I think the best method is to get it right into the field, 

 for I would rather trust nature than most men. The only 

 way that we can supplement this in the east, as I believe, is by 

 the intelligent use of chemicals. I bought 150 tons of 

 chemicals for the neighbors about our school last year, and 

 only two came back with any complaint. They had been 

 buying mixed goods before, because they were cheaper per 

 ton ; but they were so poor in quality and so high priced that 

 they had been fertilizing with money instead of fertilizers. 



