140 FARM CROPS 



will be indififerently met and the cotton lands will 

 not be improved. There must be redirection back 

 of cotton farming. 



This redirection must include cowpeas and clover, 

 stable manure, crop rotation, deep tillage and 

 modern tools and implements. If the same total of 

 manures, tillage and cultivation be given 25 acres 

 that now go to 50 acres and the other 25 acres be 

 turned over to corn and cowpeas, more profit will 

 be realized in the end. Our real good cotton farmers 

 are the proof of this. The average cotton farmer 

 must seek success by throwing aside the obsolete 

 one-horse plows and use in their place modern two- 

 horse plows that will go down to reasonable depths 

 in the soil. And this work should be begun as 

 early as possible. Not in the spring after the cotton 

 season has started; but long before, in order that 

 the land may be opened, aired, stirred up. After 

 this has been done disk occasionally to release 

 plant food and to get the soil into the very best 

 physical condition. When the planting season ap- 

 proaches, the harrow teeth should be set deep into 

 the soil to fine and mellow the earth and to let the 

 fat of the land ooze out that it may be at hand 

 when the young roots have occasion to use it. 

 These steps call for close application, but if to them 

 are added good seed and vital manures an increased 

 crop will surely result. 



Other Crops Should Be Raised. — In addition to 

 cotton there should also be legumes, corn and other 

 crops. Exclusive cotton growing is fast giving way 

 to mixed farming. Diversification is now the order 

 and every cotton farmer must get in line. Corn and 

 cowpeas should be given places of equal importance 

 with cotton. Not small, inconspicuous corners, but 



