Chicago Market Fat Stock. 

 Cailot Show Dec. 2-7 



Third annual Chicago Market Fat Stock 

 and Carlot Competition will be held at 

 the Chicago Stock Yards from Dec. 2 to 

 7, according to B. H. Heide, manager 

 of the International Livestock Exposition, 

 and in charge of the substitute event. 



The Fat Stock show will take the place 

 of the regular International, cancelled 

 following the 1941 show because of the 

 war. 



The competition will include all of the 

 fat stock classes, in both individual and 

 carlot contests, that were formerly fea- 

 tured at the International. 



Farm boys and girls will again exhibit 

 steers, lambs, and hogs in the Junior 

 Live Stock Feeding contest, a feature of 

 the market show. 



Only change over last year's classifica- 

 tion is a reduction in the upper weight 

 limit on hogs in keeping with the trend 

 to lighter weight market hogs. The 

 heavy weight class will be for barrows 

 weighing from 270 to 300 pounds. The 

 light and medium weight classes will re- 

 main the same as last year, from 200 to 

 230 pounds and from 230 to 270 

 pounds. 



Entries will be accepted for the show 

 up to Nov. 1, with the exception of the 

 carload lots of fat and feeder cattle, 

 sheep, and swine. These may be made 

 up to Nov. -25. 



The premium list for the show will 

 be available free on request to B. H. 

 Heide at the show's headquarters. Union 

 Stock Yards, Chicago. 



By John R. Spencer 



The limestone quality supervisional work 

 of this department during; August revealed 

 five new quarries in operation : one each in 

 Ogle, Boone, Pike, Winnebago counties 

 and one in Missouri which will ship by a 

 Burlington Railroad into this state. The 

 overall limestone supply picture is some- 

 what brighter due to these and the increase 

 in production facilities at many of the 

 older established quarries. 



Benjamin Franklin wrote many. years ago 

 in his Poor Richard's Almanac: "A deposit 

 of fertility in the soil bank is safest and pays 

 the best." This advice is especially approprt., 

 ate now, says the Illinois College of Agri" 

 culture, while limestone, phosphate, potash 

 and other materials which build up the - 

 productivity of the soil are cheap in rela- 



tion to the price of crops and other farm 

 products. In some localities it is difficult 

 to get sufficient limestone or other fertilizer 

 materials delivered. It is suggested that War 

 Bonds bought now and earmarked for that 

 purpose will assure a soil improvement pro- 

 gram after the war and will be safe invest- 

 ment. 



Important soil fertility elements removed 



from the land by the 1943 hemp crop were 

 found to be relatively low in comparison 

 to other farm crops, according to H. J. 

 Snider, assistant chief in soil experiment 

 fields, University of Illinois College of Agri- 

 culture. Snider reports that Number 1 hemp 

 straw as taken from the farm to the proc- 

 essing mill was found to contain approx- 

 imately 10 pounds of nitrogen in a ton. A 

 ton of corn grain (35.7 bushels) was found 

 to contain approximately 30 pounds of this 

 important element. A four-ton-an-acre yield 

 of Number I hemp straw was found to con- 

 tain a total of 73 pounds of nitrogen, phos- 

 phorus and potassium. A 75-bushel corn 

 crop, grain only, contained 94 pounds of 

 these important elements. The removal of 

 these elements by the corn crop greatly ex- 

 ceeded that removed by the straw of a large 

 hemp crop. 



Soil conservation and improvement was 



recommended as "Item No. 1" in the farm- 

 ers post-war planning, in a statement made 

 public by the Middle West Soil Improve- 

 ment Committee. "The best preparation a 

 farmer can make to meet the competitive 

 conditions of the postwar period is to build 

 up the fertility level of the soil", a state- 

 ment points out. The soils resources of ni- 

 trogen, phosphorus and potash have been 

 used up faster than they have been replaced 

 in order to meet the war time need for more 

 food. Hence, a gigantic soil rebuilding job 

 lies ahead — a job which necessarily must 

 be the responsibility of the individual farm- 

 er. 



Ogle county has seven or eight quarry 



operators producing agricultural limestone 

 in a somewhat unusual way in that their 

 equipment is moveable or portable. There 

 are a score or more of suitable limestone 

 deposits or pits of Galena-Platteville forma- 

 tion or geological name well distributed over 

 the county which have been quarried in 

 years past. Operators moved their crush- 

 ing equipment to other pits when the local- 

 ities needs have been temporarily satisfied 

 and thds, make a material saving in hauling 

 charges and wear on trucks. Prices range 

 from $1.10 to $1.30 per ton, f.o.b. quarry. 



An informational limestone quarry tour 



for farm advisers was held on Aug. 30 visit- 

 ing five operations in the area around St. 

 Louis. A shortage of available labor for 

 maximum quarry production was found at 

 all of the companies visited. 



Some 175,581 tons of rock phosphate used 

 in Illinois soils last year should get news- 

 paper headlines all over the state for it 

 is a new high record amount. It indicates 

 that farmers are taking definite action to re- 

 store this necessary fertility element phos- 

 phorus to their soils along with nitrogen 

 and potash in the well established lime- 

 stone and clover program. 177,735 tons were 

 distributed commercially and 57,846 tons 

 by the AAA program according to Dr. E. E. 

 De Turk, professor of soil fertility, U. of 

 I. College of Agriculture. 



By H. G. Iftner 



The Service Brand Feed program recently 

 announced by Illinois Farm Supply Com- 

 pany, is a service which Farm Bureau mem- 

 bers will support as wholeheartedly as any 

 service ever offered by the Farm Bureau. 

 The right kind of feed, plus quality con- 

 trol, plus economy, will mean thousands of 

 dollars to feeders and Farm Bureau support 

 to the county and state organizations. 



The Service Brand Feed program is the 

 program which country elevators have 

 needed, and in counties where there are 

 strong farmers' elevators, official boards and 

 management should consider adapting their 

 services to the Service Brand Feed program. 



Perhaps the greatest service can be offered 

 in the counties comprising the south third 

 of the state. County companies, set up to 

 handle the feed program, to own and con- 

 trol facilities for the movement of coarse 

 grains into the area and their distribution 

 therein, and to provide cooperative market- 

 ing facilities for the handling of wheat and 

 soybeans, will add further strength to the 

 southern Illinois Farm Bureaus. 



It now figures out that Illinois Grain 

 Corporation will pay its members something 

 like ll/i cents a bushel on grain marketed 

 for them last year. This is the big year for 

 Illinois Grain Corporation. It marks its 

 maturity for this is the first time the state- 

 wide agency has paid patronage in cash. 



The director spent the week of September 

 19-22 in Iowa attending district meetings 

 held at Sheldon, Mason City, Fort Dodge 

 and Des Moines, by the Farmers Grain 

 Dealers Association. Secretary Don Edison 

 and Manager Fred Maywald were high in 

 their praise and appreciation of services 

 rendered by Illinois Grain Corporation's 

 representatives, Frank Haines and E. J. Kaz- 

 marek at Chicago, N. R. Moore at Peoria, 

 and Harry Adams at St. Louis. Said May- 

 wald, "The service could not have been bet- 

 ter had we opened our own offices, and it 

 was far more economical." Said Edison, 

 "We are doing everything we can to put our 

 Iowa grain through cooperative channels." 



This would appear to be one year when 

 Illinois will lead the nation in corn pro- 

 duction as well as soybeans. On August 20 

 it was announced that only 42 per cent of 

 Iowa's corn was beyond danger of frost. 

 An untimely frost would put Illinois in the 

 lead. Let us hope that Illinois has to be 

 content with second place in corn produc- 

 tion. Corn, like nothing else, means food 

 for freedom. Stay away. Jack Frost! 



Clark county farmers applied more than 

 55,000 tons of agricultural limestone last 

 year according to Farm Adviser T. E. Myers. 



Unless a killing frost hits Randolph 

 county within the next few weeks, the river 

 bottoms along the western side of the county 

 will produce a bumper corn crop in spite of 

 floods last spring, according to the Sparta 

 News-Plaindealer. 



Grains with a low moisture content are 

 least likely to be damaged by stored grain 

 insects. 



1 



18 



I. A. A. RECORD 



