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THE IKBIGATION AGE. 



ARID AGRICULTURE 



BY 

 B. C. BUFFUM, M. S. 



Manager of the Wyoming Plant and Seed Breeding Company, Wor- 



land. Former Professor of Agriculture in the University of 



Wyoming and the Colorado Agricultural College, and 



Director of the Wyoming Agricultural 



Experiment Station. 



CROP MANAGEMENT. 



Some of the most resistant 

 crops to drouth are macaroni 

 wheat, kafir corn, sorghum, millet 

 corn, potatoes, alfalfa, brome 

 grass, wheat grass, spelt, beans, 

 winter rye, sainfoin, peas, vetches 

 and Jerusalem artichokes. Crops 

 may be resistant to other things 

 of importance as well as drouth 

 resistant. In parts of the arid re- 

 gion there are streaks where hail 

 storms are more or less frequent. 

 Some plants will withstand the 

 effects of hail much better than 

 others. A heavily bearded grain 

 like macaroni or Durum wheat or 



Turkey Red wheat will not be so badly injured by light 

 hail storms as will other kinds of grain. Flax is a good 

 hail-resistant crop and sugar beets will recover after 

 severe hail storms have practically pounded them into the 

 ground. 



Fanners are also coming to appreciate more and more 

 disease resistant crops. It seems important that we should 

 produce potatoes resistant to root rot and blight. Some 

 varieties seem more resistant to these diseases than others 

 but the matter has not been fully enough worked out to 

 make definite recommendations. We are working on the 

 leaf-spot disease of alfajfa with hopes of securing im- 

 munity from destruction by this disease. 



Good seed, good land and good farming require good 



PROF. B. C. BUFFUM. 



Dr. V. T. Cooke and the Beardless Feeding Barley Raised by Dry 

 Farming. 



planting. Special machines for planting are as important 

 as plows or other implements for preparing the ground. 

 Grain sown broadcast or potatoes planted by hand are at 

 the risk of the farmer and at the best can be expected to 

 give only indifferem returns. Grain that is broadcasted 

 and harrowed or cultivated to cover, is never well planted. 

 The work is all unevenly done. Some of the seed is cov- 

 ered too deep some not deep enough the soil is not 

 packed around the seed the plants do not have the ad- 



vantages of light, air and the cultivation they get in the 

 drill rows. 



The press drill is an essential implement for the dry 

 farmer and will pay for itself in a single season on any 

 average sized farm of the West. It plants the grain 

 evenly, at a proper depth, puts it in contact with moist 

 soil and presses the soil around the seed in a way which 

 secures quick and strong germination of the seed and the 

 best early growth of the seedling plants. A week or ten 

 days is gained in the season by this prompt germination 

 and quick growth. There is a large saving of seed which 

 is an important item. Forty pounds of seed press-drilled 



Alfalfa Stacks on Government Farm, Cheyenne. 



is equal to sixty pounds sown broadcast, a saving of 33 

 per cent. 



Planting fall or winter grains secures advantages to 

 the farmer over sowing spring crops. They have a long 

 season and usually will mature before drouth sets in. Only 

 the winter wheat, winter rye and winter emmer are hardy 

 enough in our northern arid region. Winter oats have 

 been grown as far north as northern Wyoming east of 

 the mountains, but the varieties now used cannot be de- 

 pended on to produce a crop. Winter barley is being tried 

 but it cannot be recommended as successful yet. Winter 

 rye and Turkey Red wheat give surprisingly good results. 

 Near Cheyenne these "rains stood a winter of unusual 

 drouth, there being only one and one-third inches of pre- 

 cipitation in eight months. After standing this remarkable 

 drouth, winter rye produced 44 bushels and winter wheat 

 35 bushels per acre. The author is breeding winter emmers 

 for the arid region and these grains give promise of revo- 

 lutionizing the stock-feeding industry of our western 

 plateaus. Sow winter grain on summer Jilled land in 

 September or the first half of October. At lower altitudes 

 on irrigated land some farmers have sown wheat any time 

 up to the hard freezing weather with success. Where fall 

 sown grain can be pastured it may be planted earlier. 



Spring sown crops should be planted as early as the 

 ground can be made ready and danger of heavy freezing 

 is over. Catch or volunteer crops sometimes yield enough 

 to be of value from seed that shatters off in the fall. 



Much of the success of dry farming depends on thin 

 seeding. More beginners in dry farming sow too much 

 seed rather than too little. Where grains are sown early 

 and have a correspondingly long season, there is more 

 chance for stooling. For the same reason we should ^<'^ T 

 larger amounts of seed when we are late doing the work- 

 There may be moisture enough to support ten grain plant- 

 per square foot when twenty plants would die of thirst. 

 Limited moisture therefore calls for thin planting that 

 there may be less danger of "firing" before the crop ma- 

 tures. If the season is well advanced and the soil moist 

 and warm so grains shoot up rapidly they do not take time 

 to stool or make tillers. The reason that some grains are 

 more drouth resistant than others is that they have grown 

 in dry regions so long they have lost the habit of tillering 



