CEOP PRODUCTION IN THE GREAT PLAINS AREA. 9 



There is a saving in cultivation during the spring while the green- 

 manure crop is growing, but this is partially offset by the necessity of a 

 second plowing to turn this crop under and is not sufficient to make 

 up for the cost of seed and seeding. The yields have not been com- 

 mensurate with the increase in the cost of producing them. At no 

 station have the average yields following any green manure exceeded 

 those from summer-tilled land. At all stations except Huntley and 

 Dickinson the result has been a monetary loss, both actually and in 

 comparison with other methods. These are the two stations that 

 have had the highest average yields. 



It is hardly fair to charge the whole expense of green manuring to 

 the one crop that immediately follows it, as is here done, as it should 

 have a cumulative effect in building up the soil or remedying its defi- 

 ciency in organic matter. The available evidence is that on normal 

 soils in the Great Plains area, at least in the first years of the work, 

 little effect is shown on any other than the first crop. This effect is 

 like that of a fallow, in that water is stored during the period after the 

 crop is plowed under. 



WINTER WHEAT. 



Cultural methods for winter wheat have been under trial at all sta- 

 tions except those in North Dakota. No varieties at present avail- 

 able have sufficient hardiness to survive the winters in that State. 

 In the rest of the Great Plains whiter wheat is more successful. In 

 dry falls there is trouble in getting germination and a good stand with 

 some methods. At some of the stations there is more or less trouble 

 with winterkilling. When winter wheat fails to start in the fall or to 

 survive the whiter it can often be successfully replaced with spring- 

 sown varieties. When it survives the winter, it is quite generally 

 more productive than spring wheat. At those stations where it is 

 adapted it makes a greater response to cultural methods, particularly 

 to summer tillage, than does spring wheat. Table III presents the 

 average yields and the average profit or loss from each cultural method 

 at each of the stations at which the crop has been under trial. 



At Garden City, Dalhart, and Amarillo there have been so many 

 failures and such poor yields when a crop was produced that the 

 averages are very low. At these three stations the only material 

 difference in the results from different methods has been a small 

 increase in yields on summer-tilled land at Amarillo. This increase 

 in the crop lias not been proportionally as great, however, as the 

 increase in the cost of production t>y the use of (his method. The 

 only profit from winter wheat by any method at these three stations 

 ha bees 8 Cents per acre on disked corn ground at Amarillo. 



At the Judith Basin and Hunt ley stations the season is so short that 

 it is not possible to make much difference in the time of plowing for 

 wint.r wheat. The difference has been in depth of plowing rather 



