1871.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
375 
We liad on the ten acres eighty loads of prod¬ 
uce. The loads were not large, but such as we 
usually put on when drawing in with three 
teams and three wagons. In such case, you 
know, it does not pay to put on extra large 
loads, as they are harder to pitch. But they 
were fair, medium-sized loads. The crop was 
pretty hard to thrash, as the straw and haulm 
was very long, and we raised the concave of the 
machine pretty high, and probably did not 
thrash very clean. Still we had 560 bushels 
from the ten acres, weighing 49 lbs. per bushel. 
Estimating the crop as oats, at 32 lbs. per bushel, 
the yield was equal to 88£ bushels per acre. I 
was fortunate enough to get in the crop without 
a drop of rain filling on it, and the straw will be 
fully as good as over-ripe or badly cured hay. 
Of course, I can not say that there would not 
have been just as good a crop if the manure had 
not been applied until spring, but I am inclined 
to doubt it. And, at any rate—and this was one 
of my objects—it gave an opportunity for the 
weed seeds in the manure to germinate last fall, 
and the spring plowing destroyed the plants. 
The field is the one I “fall-fallowed” three 
years ago, and, for a run-down, weedy farm, 
the land is now encouragingly clean, and I ex¬ 
pect a good crop of wheat on it next year, and 
a big crop of clover hay, with the chance of a 
good crop of clover seed the year following. 
After the clover seed is off, I propose to top- 
dress the land with some good, well-rotted ma¬ 
nure (and clover hay and peas will make good 
manure), and then, perhaps, pasture the field 
another year with sheep, until late in the fall, 
and then plow it up. The next spring I shall 
be ready to accept a challenge from the Deacon 
to see who can raise the biggest crop of corn. 
“ That is looking some distance ahead.” Yes; 
and a farmer must look ahead if he intends to 
do any thing. He must “learn to labor and to 
wait.” To a well-regulated mind, this is one of 
the charms and the advantages of agriculture. 
No great work was ever done in a hurry. The 
man who is not willing to lay plans five or ten 
years ahead, and set about accomplishin§^hem 
now, and continue the work year after year, 
keeping his object steadily in view, had better 
quit farming. All good, successful farmers 
consciously or unconsciously possess this quali¬ 
ty of planning, working, and waiting. 
“What is the good of all this talk about im¬ 
proved farming?” remarks a grain speculator; 
“ the trouble is that we raise too much produce 
already.” Without admitting or disputing this 
assertion, it may be remarked that the province 
of an agricultural paper is not so much to in¬ 
duce farmers to raise a greater aggregate 
amount of produce, as to show them how it can 
be raised cheaper. What I advocate is trying 
to raise forty bushels of wheat per acre once 
in four years, instead of twenty bushels every 
other year, or ten bushels every year. I do not 
want farmers to raise more pigs than they do 
now, but I would like to see them raise better 
ones. I am sorry to see a farmer feed ten bush¬ 
els of corn to produce a hundred pounds of 
pork, when a well-bred pig would produce the 
same amount of pork, and of far better quality, 
from six or seven bushels. 
The present over-production in certain arti¬ 
cles of farm produce is not the result of improved 
agriculture. It is the result of too many fanners 
turning their attention to the production of one 
tiling to the neglect of others. A few years ago 
they sold their cattle for a song, to buy sheep 
at high prices; subsequently, they sacrificed 
their sheep to go into the dairy business or hog¬ 
raising, or back again to cattle feeding. Now 
they will sell their cattle and hogs, and go into 
sheep again. There may have been agricultural 
writers who have advocated these various 
changes, but I am not one of them. What I 
preach and what I endeavor to practice is to be 
content with fair profits, to raise such crops and 
keep such animals as are best suited to the land 
and the location, and stick to it year after year, 
be prices what they may. 
Our Ogden Farm friend thinks my advice to 
the young Kansas farmer who wanted some 
thorough-bred stock is not sound—that it does 
not “ do full justice to the breeders.” I beg his 
and other breeders’ pardon. No one appreciates 
their labors more highly than I do. But they 
are quite capable of taking care of themselves. 
My sympathies are with the young farmers who 
wish to buy thorough-bred animals to improve 
their common stock, and who have little money 
to spare. I have been in precisely that position 
myself. I can recollect,when I first commenced 
farming, writing to Mr. Thorn, asking him if he 
had a thorough-bred Shorthorn bull that was 
not of the stylish, fashionable kind that brings 
fancy prices, but which nevertheless had a good 
pedigree, and one which would, consequently, 
impress its characteristics on the calves from 
common cows, that he could sell me at a price 
a poor farmer could afford to pay. He offered 
me a calf for $125. I thought this too much, 
and wrote to Mr. Sheldon, and he asked me 
$300 ! The result was I did not buy one—and 
there I missed it. I think it would have been a 
thousand dollars in my pocket by this time if I 
had. But I needed every dollar I had to under¬ 
drain, kill weeds, and otherwise improve my 
farm. And while I know I have lost money by 
not using a thorough-bred bull, it is equally cer¬ 
tain that I should have lost still more if I had 
taken $125 out of my draining operations and 
invested in a calf. I ought to have done both. 
But I lacked pluck. 
Now what our Ogden Farm friend says is all 
true. We have no right to find fault with the 
breeders for asking high prices. But, on the 
other hand, when a young farmer who is strain¬ 
ing every nervS to improve his land asks my 
opinion as to how he can at the same time im¬ 
prove his stock, I have a right to advise him 
“not to be in a hurry,” and not to pay “fancy 
prices”—to visit some of the breeders in his 
own State or county, and see if he could not 
find an animal with a good pedigree that could 
be got at a price he could afford to pay. Kecol- 
lect I was writing to a young farmer who did 
not propose at present to raise pure-bred stock, 
but who merely wanted a thorough-bred bull 
for the purpose of raising animals for the butcher. 
It would be ridiculous for a man to pay “ $5,000” 
for a bull in such a case, no matter how rich the 
man might be, or how good the bull was ; and 
it would be simple madness for a young farmer, 
who needed all his money to improve his farm, 
to buy such an animal. 
“ Ogden Farm ” does not believe in the idea 
of “ fancy prices.” I agree with him perfectly 
in what he says on this point. Still I happen 
to know that a good many people pay fancy 
prices for fancy stock. Think of paying $1,000 
for a Berkshire pig! “ But if he is worth it, 
why not?” Simply because a pig is merely a 
machine for converting corn into .pork, and 
unless some new chemical or physiological dis¬ 
covery has been made, one good Berkshire pig 
will, on the average, produce as much pork 
from a given quantity of food as another. If 
you have two Berkshire pigs, each a good 
specimen of the breed, and both equally well 
bred, I can not imagine any real reason why 
one should be worth $1,000 and the other only 
$50. I think it is mere “fancy.” When, a few 
j-ears ago, people paid $500, $1,000, and even 
$10,000 for an American merino buck, I think 
they paid “ fancy prices.” 
Mark you, I am not arguing against thorough¬ 
bred stock. No man believes in it more enthu¬ 
siastically than I do. But even gold can be 
bought too dear. I think the young Kansas 
farmer, if lie follows my advice, and buys a 
good, fair, thorough-bred Shorthorn bull, at a 
moderate figure, and avoids delusive hopes and 
fancy prices, will have no cause to regret it. 
The Benefits of Fall Plowing. 
That the plowing of heavy soils in the fall is 
attended with excellent results is generally ad¬ 
mitted. That any benefit accrues to soils of a 
lighter texture, is questioned by many agricul¬ 
turists, with whom we do not altogether agree. 
All admit that the tenacious character of 
a clay soil is reduced, and its texture opened 
and rendered less compact, by the opera¬ 
tion of frost. The lumps fall apart, and are 
disintegrated by the mechanical effect of the 
expansion in the act of freezing of the water 
held between the particles. The field, which 
at the commencement of winter exhibited only 
a surface of shapeless clods, in the spring 
is seen to have been brought into a condition of 
mellowness which no amount of plowing or 
harrowing could ha'se effected. But is this the 
full effect of the forces of nature, which operate 
in small things as perfectly as in greater? The 
power which has forced asunder the clods, and 
reduced them to fragments, has also had an 
effect upon those fragments themselves, and has 
reduced them to particles so small, that the 
solubility of the soil has been increased. Thus 
another effect besides a mechanical one has been 
produced; or rather the operation of mechanical 
force has brought about conditions under which 
chemical action can more readily take place. 
Now, can we believe that this result only oc¬ 
curs in the case of clay soils? If this should 
be so, then, as there is a variety of such soils, 
the effect must be proportioned to the nature of 
the soil. If a clay soil is benefited, is not also 
a clay loam? And if a clay loam, why not a 
sandy loam ? If the particles of a clay soil are 
rendered more soluble by this exposure to the 
frosts of winter, and those particles are mainly 
alumina and silica, how can another soil alto¬ 
gether escape similar effects, when only the 
proportions in which those constituents are com¬ 
bined are changed. But we are told that clay 
soils are absorbent, while more silicious soils 
are more or less leacliy, and part with their 
fertile properties by the percolation of water 
through them. Then, if this were true, a light 
or sandy soil would in course of time be washed 
free from all fertilizing properties. But this is 
not the case with these soils. They can be im¬ 
proved by the addition of manure until their 
characters are changed; the added color and 
other qualities are not washed awaj 1 -. If this 
idea of leachiness, then, is unfounded, no harm, 
but only benefit, can result from plowing such 
soils in the fall. They will experience as much 
improvement in one sense as a heavier clay 
soil. The reduction of hard lumps is not neces¬ 
sary, for these soils are naturally mellow, but 
