American Agriculturist, December 27, 1924 
Editorial 
American * 
Agriculturist 
Founded 1842 
0 - - - - -• • -= 
IIenky Morgenthau, Jr .Publisher 
E.Tt- Eastman. .. Editor 
Fred W. Ohm ..Associate Editor 
Mrs. G. E. FoRBUsn.Household Editor 
Bihge Kinne ....... Advertising Manager 
E. C. Weatherby .Circulation Manager 
CONTRIBUTING STAFF 
Uared V-an Wagenen, Jr. M. C. Burritt 
H. E. Cook G. T. Hughes 
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Page ot the American Agriculturist 
Happy New Year 
The entire "staff of American Agricuturist 
joins with the publisher, Henry Morgentium, Jr., 
and the editor, E. R. Eastman, in wishing that 
1925 may bring to you and yours a heaping 
measure of prosperity, contentment and happi¬ 
ness! 
son, we may look for much lower grain prices. 
Always wd meet the same old problem of over¬ 
production. We farmers never seem to learn 
the lesson. 
The frosts held off very well, giving corn 
an opportunity to ripen, although there was a 
large amount of soft corn and good seed corn 
is scarce and high. 
Cotton was a big crop and brought the grow¬ 
er good prices. 
hope for much better prices later on. In spite 
of the nice weather, many growers in the East 
were caught by the unseasonable spell of cold 
weather and thousands of bushels were frozen 
in the ground. This was bad. for such growers, 
but good for the general potato market situa¬ 
tion. 
Cabbage was also a big crop, resulting in 
very low prices. There have been a few spurts 
—short lived—when there was an upward 
turn, but holdings are too heavy to warrant 
much higher prices, except for these temporary 
local increases. 
Generally speaking, the fruit grower has had 
a pretty good yeai\ Production was none too 
good, prices have been very fair, and have re¬ 
mained fairly steady throughout the season. 
Poultry, too, in all of its branches, has been 
in an especially good position during the past 
year, and the prospects are still good. 
Sheep raisers are in a very strong position. 
They have made money for two years, and the 
outlook for prices is still good.- The world is 
short of textiles, resulting in a steady demand 
at good prices. 
The hog situation is headed toward a higher 
price level. A large number of hogs went to 
market this fall, which may result in a general 
shortage with resulting good prices for the 
over, but it has been better for nearly every¬ 
body than has prevailed during two or three 
of the preceding years, and there are pretty 
good indications that this improvement is go¬ 
ing to continue and grow stronger through the 
season of 1925. 
S v 
r __ 
For Old and Young Breeders 
T HERE are few men in. America who know 
more of the ups and downs, the joys and 
sorrows, of cattle breeding than DeWitt C. 
Wing, editor of Breeder’s Gazette, who con¬ 
tributes the feature article this time, entitled, 
“Pitfalls for Young Breeders”. This article is 
another contribution from the editorial board 
of the Standard Farm Paper Group, of which 
American Agriculturist is a member. 
< < 
Kill A Kow” Klubs 
coming season. 
Our Tax Reduction Program 
I. The abolition of a direct State tax on 
* property. 
iL-r-No further reduction in income taxes 
until government taxes are reduced. 
III. Discontinuance of the issuing of tax ex¬ 
empt securities. 
IV. A carefully prepared detailed budget for 
every government unit from the nation 
to the county. 
V. Full publicity and information to tax¬ 
payers showing the exact purposes, with 
amounts, for which taxes are spent. 
VI. We are also in favor of: 
1. Larger taxation of personal property. 
2. Gasoline sales tax, and 
3. Taxing billboards along sides of State 
highways. 
We are working for your relief on the above 
stated principles. Do you think they are 
right? If so, will you get behind them by 
dropping us a line? 
—- . 
The Market Situation at a Glance 
T HE cose of the year is a good time to take 
a glance at the farm marketing situation, 
both to dispose of any crops that you may 
have on hand, and as a basis of making plans 
for the coming season. Crops are all harvested 
and many of them have gone to market. The 
railroads are to be congratulated this year for 
the good service they rendered to farmers in 
moving a heavy volume of products on time. 
However, there has been a large'hold over of 
many products that could be held in storage. 
l The outstanding development of this year’s 
^Tnarkets were the good wheat and other grain 
prices which prevailed and the good yields of 
these grains which most American farmers 
had. Whether the good times which came to 
the grain growers this year will continue is 
somewhat doubtful. There was a considerable 
increase in the acreage of wheat planted this 
fall, and if this acreage yields well, and if the 
world’s supply of wheat is* good for next sea¬ 
Producers of beef cattle are having a dis¬ 
couraging period, and because of the high feed 
prices, beef producers have gotten rid of as 
many animals as possible. In commenting on 
the situation in the livestock and dairy indus¬ 
tries, the United States Department of Agri¬ 
culture states as follows: 
“Broadly speaking, the livestock industry is 
traveling through the bottom of a price cycle. 
During the war, great effort was directed toward 
production of the major money crops. Severe post¬ 
war depression coincident with remarkable heavy* 
yields of the main feed crops turned much produc¬ 
tive effort back on the animal industries. Live¬ 
stock helped to carry along and work off the crop 
surpluses, Now grain surplus has become shortage. 
Sheep have already recovered and hogs are next. 
The present lesson to stock raisers” (and to dairy¬ 
men) “is to improve their herds while improving 
is cheap.”* 
The dairy situation, too, looks a little better. 
The Dairymen’s League pool price for Novem¬ 
ber was $2.35, with 9 cents out for expenses 
and 10 cents borrowed for certificates of in¬ 
debtedness. This is forty cents higher than 
October gross pool price. It is thg highest 
pool price since November a year ago, when 
the gross pool price was $2.43. Exclusive of 
October and November a year ago, it is the 
highest pool price since February, 1923. 
One encouraging feature of the dairy situa¬ 
tion is the way the butter market has held up. 
Fresh creameries have been in somewhat short 
supply. This greatly helped the dangerous 
butter storage situation, so that there has been 
considerable movement out of storage on to 
the market. Some improvement is to be noted 
also in condensed and evaporated milk mar¬ 
kets. 
The dairy situation, however, is still dis¬ 
couraging, but as has already been pointed out, 
it is taking its turn with the other farm pro¬ 
ducts in the up and down cycle, and is sure to 
come into better times for those men who have 
cleaned out the poor producers and given close 
attention to getting their dairy on a business 
basis. 
On the whole, there have been worse years 
for agriculture than 1924. For those general 
farmers who have had different kinds of pro¬ 
ducts to market, the year has turned out'pretty 
well. The situation has been nothing to boast 
T HE “Kill A Kow” herd is still growing, 
and we receive every day suggestions from 
our readers on how to help this good work 
along. One of these suggestions was that 
there might well be a “Kill A Kow and Kan A 
Kow Ivlub” in every community. The forma¬ 
tion of such clubs would help to solve the prob¬ 
lem of what to do with the meat. Nearly 
every rural county has a home bureau and 
home bureau clubs, and many of these bureaus 
are provided with pressure canners. Why not 
ask your home bureau agent to arrange for a 
demonstration in your community with the 
pressure canner, showing how to can a cow 
so that you could have beef as good as fresh 
the year around? 
We really believe that there are few things 
farm people can do that will help the dairy 
business along more than this reduction of 
production, by taking out the non-producers. 
And if a little cooperation among neighbors is 
.shown a profit on the transaction can be re¬ 
alized both ways, first, by removing these 
worthless cows from the herds, and, second, 
by reducing the cost of living by eating the 
beef at home. 
Why would not this “Kill A Kow and Kan 
A Kow Klub” idea be a good subject for dis¬ 
cussion at your next home bureau meeting? 
Or at your Grange meeting? So many of our 
talks at meetings lead to nowhere. Here is an 
opportunity for some practical working to¬ 
gether which tvill result in benefit to every 
dairy family. 
Eastman’s Chestnuts 
I HAVE been very busy fighting the blight in 
my chestnut grove, which I called attention 
to last week. Some of my over-frank friends 
had been unkind enough to suggest that I 
should have begun my fight against the blight 
some time ago, judgingfrom the wormy chest¬ 
nuts which the grove was turning out! On the 
other hand, many have Reined really concern¬ 
ed that the grove was disappearing, so I have 
renewed my fight and managed to save* a few 
trees. Among these trees there is one that is 
bearing a pretty fair crop of Scotch chestnuts. 
From time immemorial the Scotchman has 
had fun poked at him because of his excessive 
economy. "'But I sometimes wonder, particu¬ 
larly in these later days of extravagance, if the 
Scotchman is not right and the most of the 
rest of us wrong. 
In Scotland there is a legend that if money 
is thrown into a certain river, it will bring good 
luck. So Sandy tried it, and later spoke of his 
venture as follows: 
“Mon, mon, I nair lost my bonnie PENNY 
when the STRING got tangled with the 
rocks !”• 
Quotations Worth While 
To get things coming our way, it is first neces¬ 
sary to go after them. 
* * * 
“Success does not depend so much on external 
help as on self-reliance.”— Lincoln, 
