104 DRY LAND FARMING 



grow more or less thinly than when they are too numer- 

 ous. Should the plants be too few to result in maximum 

 production, nature in part at least makes up for the lack 

 by the abundant stooling of the plants. This stooling, 

 so marked in dry areas under proper conditions of 

 growth, is caused in part at least by the strength of the 

 root system developed in such areas. 



Grain and forage plants in dry areas are dwarfish 

 in their habits of growth. This peculiarity is character- 

 istic of all dry areas, and, other things being equal, it is 

 present increasingly as the moisture decreases. Grains 

 in the dry areas are usually much shorter than the same 

 in humid areas. The same is true of corn and other for- 

 age plants. Even fruit trees do not attain to a near 

 approach in size to the same varieties in humid areas. 

 The scarcity of moisture is doubtless in part and prob- 

 ably chiefly responsible for this result, as enough mois- 

 ture is not present to promote rapid growth during the 

 season for the same. The lack of rainfall that is usually 

 present after midsummer makes the growing seasons 

 very short and tends much to hasten maturity. 



The fruitage in plants is very abundant. This char- 

 acteristic pervades all plant life. It is seen not only in 

 the relatively large yields obtained from dwarfish fields 

 of grain, but it is also seen in the enormous fruitage 

 that characterizes growth in all kinds of fruit-bearing 

 trees, the large as well as the small. It is the outcome 

 in part of the abundant food materials in the soil for 

 the production of seed and fruit rather than of wood, 

 stem and leaf growth, and in part of the absence of exu- 

 berance in the growth of these. Marked exuberance in 

 the growth of wood in the tree, or of stem and leaves 

 in the plants, draws the energies of the plant, so to speak, 

 away from the production of fruit or seed. It would also 

 seem to be a law of nature that the harder the struggle 



