134 CONTINUOUS CROPPING 



only be £3. We mustn't forget, too, that we have a 

 crop worth at least as much as los. per ton, or £10 per 

 acre, as food, apart from its manurial value. 



ECONOMICAL USE OF CAPITAL 



In like manner the manurial value of green vetches 

 is 5s. 8d. per ton, and twelve to sixteen tons per statute 

 acre can be raised worth as food £8 to ;{io per acre and 

 costing about £4 per acre to produce. 



Further, in the table referred to, it is assumed that 

 the food is consumed indoors, and the manure stored 

 in a heap, the further assumption being that one-half 

 the nitrogen and one-fourth of the phosphate are lost 

 in storage. But by consuming the crop on the land 

 there would be practically no loss of these two in- 

 gredients, and hence the manurial value of giant rape 

 and kales would be approximately 7s. and green 

 vetches 9s. per ton of food consumed respectively. 



Again, whilst the ultimate aim of our smallholder 

 should, as has been frequently stated, be dairying, there 

 are few at the outset who could purchase sufficient 

 dairy cows to consume all the crops, grown under the 

 system recommended, on a holding. The question 

 arises would not one kind of stock require as great a 

 capital outlay as another ? 



The answer is a very emphatic "No.'' 



The general recommendation made throughout 

 these pages is first to convert the three sources of 

 production — ^land, labour, and capital — ^into crops, 

 and afterwards convert the crops into live stock and 

 live-stock products, and subsequently into cash. 

 Bearing this in mind, we can take a concrete case of 

 the validity of the previous statement. 



Suppose a small farmer had, say, £80 for the pur- 

 chase of stock, which stock he required for the purpose 



