Gbe IRatfonal IRurservim 
FOR GROWERS AND DEALERS IN NURSERY STOCK 
The National Nurseryman Publishing Co., Incorporated. 
Vol. XVIII ROCHESTER, N. Y., AUGUST, 1910 No. 8 
EDITORIAL WANDERINGS 
The Season Out of Joint. The Middle West. The Passing of the Great 
American Desert 
A trip of some seven thousand miles from New York to 
the western slope of Colorado and south to Florida during 
the fore part of June revealed unusual seasonal aberrations. 
The exceptionally warm wave of March, continental in 
extent, was succeeded by cold rains interspersed by colder 
frosts and snows, which continued with wearying monotony 
up to the middle of May when the frost period may be said 
to have closed. But in the Mississippi Valley at any rate 
cold rains retarded vegetation very seriously as late as 
June tenth. 
In crossing Iowa and Illinois the second week of June, 
the backwardness of the corn crop, only then appearing 
above ground, was a general source of comment. A week 
later in Missouri the corn seemed to have made very little 
progress, while it was astonishing to find in Tennessee and 
Northern Alabama, cotton only a few inches high and corn 
only fairly well established as late as the middle of June. 
Eastern Kansas and Nebraska had suffered in common 
with the entire Mississippi Valley and it will certainly take 
a lot of summer heat to even things up by the usual harvest 
period. Central Kansas seemed to be the western boundary 
of the wet belt. Eastern Kansas was certainly soaked and 
the outlook for corn farmers was discouraging as late as the 
middle of June. Potatoes, however, looked well, as seen 
from the car window, from Kansas City to St. Louis. This 
is a great mule country and the breeding of this splendid 
work-animal seems to be a thriving branch of animal 
husbandry. 
AGRICULTURAL CONDITIONS IN THE MIDDLE WEST 
Iowa and Illinois arc the greatest purely agricultural 
states in the union. Land values have increased from 50 to 
100 per cent during the last ten years. The movement is 
upward in most places, even at the present time, but it is not 
likely to advance much more until the newer lands farther 
west are occupied and improved. 
Remarkable it is that in a preeminently rich agricultural 
state like Iowa there has been practically no increase in pop¬ 
ulation during the last decade. It is more than probable 
too that there are fewer people residing on farms today than 
there were ten years ago. The drift is from the country to 
the town or city. Iowa is a state characterized by a large 
number of small cities. It is quite the custom for the well- 
to-do Iowa farmer of middle life to sell or rent his farm and 
retire to the town. It often happens too that the farm is 
bought by the local capitalist who works it in conjunction 
with other lands in the vicinity, and the countryside loses a 
family. It is a remarkable fact that some of the richest 
counties in Iowa, Illinois and Ohio have lost in population 
during the last decade. On the contrary most of the cities 
in this region have increased—some of them doubling their 
population during the period. If then the population of 
the state of Iowa has not increased as a whole while the 
towns and cities have grown much more populous it follows 
that the country has supplied the men and women who 
have enlarged the cities. Is not this the condition in New 
York and New England, which is the cause of so much anxiety 
on the part of Secretary Wilson and certain supposedly well 
meaning politicians? As land values increase the tendency 
is for this land representing the capital of the country to 
drift into the possession of the moneyed class. It is prob¬ 
ably safe to say that Iowa can claim more landlords today 
than at any previous period in her history. As landlordism 
increases more country houses will be unoccupied, and 
shall we not hear very soon of “abandoned farms’’ (rather 
abandoned homes) in the fertile Hawkeye State as well as 
among the hills of New England and New York? 
The capitalist who invests merely for the purpose of safe¬ 
guarding some money, feeling that the natural increase in 
land values will give him a fair interest on his investment, is 
a poor type of country citizen—and yet they are to be found 
on every side. These are the persons who retard agricul¬ 
tural progress. One live, intelligent farmer is worth more to 
his country than a score of such landholders. The example 
of a successful farmer is a most valuable stimulus in a com¬ 
munity while the inaction of the uninterested capitalist 
acts as a brake on the wheels of agricultural advancement. 
IRRIGATION AND DRY LAND FARMING 
In making a trip eastward over the Colorado Midland 
and Rock Island Railways from the western slope of the 
Rockies to the Missouri River the traveler has exhibited 
before him in an interesting way the various stages between 
arid conditions and adequate rainfall distributed normally 
as to quantity and season. On the west slope of Colorado 
and the high interior tableland one sees a type of vegeta¬ 
tion developed as a result of peculiar fitness for semi arid 
conditions. The bunch grasses, the sage brush, the cactus 
