2 BULLETIN 705, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
Some of the factors which tend to influence efficiency on these 
farms are: (1) The area of land in summer fallow; (2) the income 
per productive animal unit; (3) crop yields; and (4) the percentage 
of the field-crop area devoted to clover and other legumes. 
Clover seed was a profitable crop in 1912. During that year over 
10 per cent of the total receipts of the silt loam farms were derived 
from the sale of clover seed, though the crop occupied only 4.5 per 
cent of the rotation area. 
Comparative yields and values of the cereal crops per acre strongly 
indicate that the area devoted to oats on both the clay and silt loam 
farms should be reduced, with a view to growing more profitable 
crops. 
The farm income of the clay farms was 4.35 per cent of the capital 
invested, as compared with 6.64 per cent for the silt loam farms. 
In other words, the silt loam farms were a half more profitable 
than the clay farms. The clay farms grow less clover and other 
legumes than the silt loam farms, had a greater acreage and lower 
yield of oats, and had a much larger percentage of the rotation area 
lying idle as summer fallow. 
Crop yields may be increased materially on most of the farms 
studied by devoting more of the tillable land to clover and other 
legumes. A few of the silt loam farms were probably devoting 
sufficient area to these crops. 
That clover can be grown successfully on the clay farms is shown 
by the 53 trials, covering over 1,000 acres, on 83.8 per cent of which 
successful stands were obtained. 
AGRICULTURAL HISTORY OF THE VALLEY. 
Between 1850 and 1860 most of the prairie lands of the Willamette 
Valley were brought under cultivation. Even as early as 1844 
there was a surplus wheat crop of 10,000 bushels. In the very be- 
ginning of the agricultural development of the valley, wheat became 
the leading crop. Oats were also an important crop, and corn was 
grown in a limited way. Timothy and cheat x were the principal 
hay crops. Clover was tried superficially and pronounced a failure 
because the first trials failed to give satisfactory stands. From the 
most reliable information available it appears that wheat in those 
early days yielded from 30 to 40 bushels per acre and oats from 50 
to 75 bushels. 
For a number of years the land produced a crop each year. How- 
ever, the soil soon became infested with wild oats, and about 1865 
the farmers began to summer fallow; that is, the land was clean 
cultivated once in every three or four years. Under this system of 
i Bromus secalinus. 
