63 CROP 



ROTATION 



your small area rest, so you must make up to 

 the land by giving it plant food enough. 



In these days machinery has made so many 

 wonderful changes in the management of crops 

 that the farmer who sticks to the old farming 

 customs has no chance of making more than a 

 living. When the country was new, it was the 

 practice to farm one section until it was ex- 

 hausted, and then to move to fresh soil. The 

 farmer was saved the bother of cultivating, as 

 virgin soil needed practically only to be planted 

 to bring forth a good harvest. But conditions 

 have changed and the virgin soil left today is 

 not important in the farming possibilities. 

 Therefore, we have had to look for other means 

 of getting crops and making every inch of land 

 do its share- We no longer allow land to lie 

 fallow that it may rest and renew itself. We 

 renew it by fertilizing and by rotation of crops. 

 Crop rotation is very valuable because it is a 

 saving of fertilizer and labor, and keeps the soil 

 in good condition. This has been proved by 

 experiments made without manure, depending 

 entirely upon rotation for fertilizing, which 

 gave excellent results. 



There are probably a dozen or more good 

 reasons for the value of crop rotation which 

 have not yet been discovered and formulated, 

 but the following are well known : 



