194 



THIRD ANNUAL SESSIONS 



it made smaller lumps, yet it didn't have that condition where the nitrates 

 might be developaa. 



"I just mentioned these to show you if you carry out proper ideas 

 there is no difficulty in growing good crops every time, but if we proceed 

 as a great many have done, who have come into the semr-arid belt, and 

 we get some of our old fashioned ideas, there is going to be trouble, there 

 is no use talking. There is no successful farming in the semi-arid lielt 

 by following the old plans adopted in the east. 



Causes of Failure. 



'This Autumn I visited two or three sections where a number of peo- 

 ple had given up in disgust and gone back East simply because they didn t 

 know how. In the extreme west end of Oklahoma, on a strip of the pan- 

 handle, is a gentleman who carried our plan out to quite a degree -aiid 

 produced 3? bushels of wheat to the acre, where his nerglibors were pack- 

 ing up and getting out of the country because they got nothing. He eaid 

 to me that frequently they would stop at his well — that was the early 

 part of last year — to water their teams and sometimes camp, and he said 

 it was a common remark: 'If only we had wheat like that we would have 

 stayed on our place.' One man knew how, the other didn't. Gentlemen, 

 are there any questions?" 



DR. COOKE. "How much moisture did you receive when you got 

 67 bushels to the acre?" 



PROF. CAMPBELL: "Mr. Burnett will have to answer that question 

 as I am not familiar with the conditions at all." 



Precipitation. 



MR. BURNETT: "The 67 bushels was the 190S yield and we had 19 

 inches of rainfall. 15 inches between March and the 1st of August." 

 Summer Fallow. 



DR. COOKE: "Was that summer tilled land?" 



MR. BURNETT: "Summer tilled in 1907. In 1907 we had a little 

 more rain fall than in 1908, but both were very near normal, about 19 

 inches." 



DR. COOKE: "Nineteen inches during summer fallow?" 



MR. BURNETT: "Some of that after the crop was harvested." 



Soil Treatment. 



PROP. JARDINE: "What difference did you make in the prepa- 

 ration of your land when you plowed in the fall and v/hen you plowed in 

 the spring? A great many farmers believe in plowing in the fall." 



PROF. CAMPBELL: "I don't know as that would make and particu- 

 lar difference. One thing we adhere to, not to plow unless the ground 

 is in condition to plow. This subject was touched on yesterday T could 

 relate an experience that occurred a great man^^ years ago, that perhaps 

 might throw some light on the subject. In 1882, in South Dakota, we 

 had the most ideal season I think I ever experienced anywhere and 40 

 bushels of spring wheat was quite common, not because any of us knew 

 how to farm, but because we were favored with cond'tions that were just 



