THE DRY FARMING CONGRESS. 



229 



man, homesteader, and dry farmer that has been in the West over, forty 

 years, should interest many in this audience. 



Causes of Failure. 



"First, a very large per cent, of the people in Lincoln county and in 

 fact all of the semi-arid districts are new people who have been renters 

 in the east or day laborers who have come west to better their condi- 

 tions. They have very little surplus money, and they figure on getting 

 some returns from their money as quickly as possible. 



"They break a few acres, and must put it to sod crop that year in 

 order to secure the next winter's feed, and sard crops keep them from 

 summer tilling. 



"The next year their funds are nearly exhausted, and they must 

 figure for the present year again, and could not possibly think of doing 

 work for the year ahead. Others look on it as an experiment; I remem- 

 ber 41 years ago in eastern Nebraska, while on my father's homestead, 

 my father suggested that he believed that apples could be grown in 

 Nebraska, and it would be a good thing to plant a small orchard for an 

 experiment, and I remarked that that was looking too far ahead, that 

 before the trees were bearing, he would be dead, and I would be gone 

 back east. 



Dry Land Fruit. 



"However, we did set out an orchard afterwards, and saw it bear 

 fruit. I set out an orchard in Lincoln county, Colorado, for a Denver man 

 and afterwards purchased the same land and ate apples from said or- 

 chard for several years. 

 Cambell System. 



"One of the causes of the slow development of the Campbell system 

 is that it causes homesteaders to prepare the land a year ahead, and the 

 larger per cent of them think they have all that they can attend to, to 

 take care of the present year 



"Another class of farmers that have s^en the good effects on crops 

 put in under scientific system, say that it is all right, and that they will 

 put in quite an acreage next year in said manner, but are like the man 

 who knows if he gets up early in the morning, he will get in a good 

 day's work, and even on account of his good resolves sets his alarm 

 clock, and when he hears it rattle the next morning, tells it to go to 

 thunder and rolls over for another nap, saying, I will get up early to- 

 morrow morning. 



"The speaker has had good results from following the Campbell 

 system, but is in fault for selling off his old land, and buying new land, 

 and like my brother farmers, hard up and tempted to put in sod crops, 

 so as to obtain some crops to help pay for the land. 

 Alfalfa. 



"Alfalfa is going to be the king of crops for most of the semi-arid 

 countries and will be a money maker for both forage crops and for 



