August 22, 1913] 



SCIENCE 



253 



soil whether it will produce normal wheat 

 under normal weather conditions than they 

 were able, twenty-two years ago, to predict 

 whether a certain soil would or would not 

 produce a scabby, gnarled, bin-rotting lot 

 of potatoes. Nor are they any nearer ac- 

 curate in their diagnosis of the causes of 

 the irregularities of results which are at- 

 tendant upon present best methods of crop 

 rotation and especially attendant upon the 

 results of the one crop system of wheat 

 growing, than they and others were, but a 

 few years since, when it was continually re- 

 iterated that flax wears out or poisons the 

 land against its own growth, that flax is 

 a very "destructive crop on fertility," 

 that flax is very "hard on land," etc., that 

 flax "should have a deep, loose, mellow 

 seed bed and be highly manured if one 

 expects to succeed with it at all." All of 

 which assertions have been abundantly dis- 

 proved within the past fifteen years. 



The chemist and his followers might not 

 have made these errors had the laboratory 

 investigators been willing to go more often 

 into the flax flelds and to delve more deeply 

 into the dirt rather than more deeply into 

 the archives of written books to gain ideas 

 as to why the crop was dying. 



The Present Status of Cereal Cropping. 

 — That there is a real problem before the 

 agriculturists of the world, especially as 

 affecting the question of maintaining the 

 output of wheat in amoimt and quality, all 

 must agree. The present approximate an- 

 nual output of 700,000,000 bushels in its 

 occurrence is somewhat analogous to the 

 varying annual output of gold. It is 

 maintained at these approximate figures, 

 essentially not through increased yields of 

 grain of better quality per acre on old cul- 

 tivated areas through certain exact meth- 

 ods, but rather through the breaking up or 

 turning over of new areas, in the same 

 wasteful methods. The most alarming fea- 



ture of the whole condition rests not so 

 much in these facts as in the evident rapid 

 deterioration of the quality of grain which 

 invariably accompanies the first few years 

 of cropping upon the new land areas. 

 Indeed, in some of the newer great wheat- 

 producing regions the most fertile new 

 lands do not produce wheat now either in 

 yield per acre or in quality similar to that 

 which adjoining lands did when first put 

 under wheat culture. This and similar 

 problems the writer believes he is now able 

 to explain. Commonly, the new lands at 

 first, even though of light texture, and of 

 low chemical fertility, are expected and 

 usually do produce grain above the ordi- 

 nary average as to quality in color, form 

 and milling texture, but, very soon, in spite 

 of the best teachings of our experiment 

 stations and most noted agricultural ad- 

 visers and experts, even though they them- 

 selves attempt the culture, the yield per 

 acre and the quality drops off to such ex- 

 tent that the millers complain bitterly. 

 There is no certainty of quality (grade) 

 occurring, year by year, regardless of the 

 native fertility of the soil whether high or 

 low. The best old cropped soils which the 

 chemist himself will assert are of higher 

 fertility than many of the new unplowed 

 lands, are no more certain of giving success 

 with wheat as to these matters of grade 

 and milling quality than the very poorest. 

 This is but to be expected, for even though 

 there be only fertility of a particular type 

 sufficient for three or four bushels of seed 

 per acre, biologically, there are no reasons 

 why the crop should not, under conditions 

 of health, mature normal seed. 



On account of all these conditions of low- 

 yield and invariable deficiency in quality, 

 there has gone up a great cry of "de- 

 pleted" soils, "worn out" land, "bad agri- 

 culture," "shiftless methods," etc. This 

 cry follows the plowman regardless of his 



