Produced by Tom Roch, ronnie sahlberg and the Online
file was produced from images produced by Core Historical
Literature in Agriculture (CHLA), Cornell University)

[Illustration: Hon. R. W. Dunlap, Kingston, Ohio, graduate of course in
agriculture, Ohio State University, 1895, noted football player, state
senator, state dairy and food commissioner. Farmer and institute
lecturer. Introduced alfalfa fourteen years ago into his farm and
community. Introduced commercial fertilizers and raised thereby more
wheat from 50 acres than his father did from 150 acres, thus convincing
his father and neighbors that when rightly used commercial fertilizers
paid. Mr. Dunlap claimed that the agricultural college made him a farmer,
because when he left for college he had no intention of returning to the
farm.]

                                 The
                            Young Farmer

                     Some Things He Should Know

                                _By_

                           THOMAS F. HUNT

          Imperial man! Co-worker with the wind
          And rain and light and heat and cold, and all
          The agencies of God to feed and clothe
          And render beautiful and glad the world!
                                               --_Stockard_

                              NEW YORK
                         ORANGE JUDD COMPANY

                               LONDON
             KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRÜBNER & CO., Limited
                                1913

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                         ORANGE JUDD COMPANY

                              ----------

                     Entered at Stationers' Hall
                          _LONDON, ENGLAND_

                         PRINTED IN U. S. A.

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                              CONTENTS

CHAPTER                                  PAGE
      I  ESSENTIALS OF SUCCESS              1
     II  MEANS OF ACQUIRING LAND           14
    III  FARM ORGANIZATION                 31
     IV  OPPORTUNITIES IN AGRICULTURE      44
      V  WHERE TO LOCATE                   57
     VI  SIZE OF FARM                      64
    VII  SELECTION OF FARM                 71
   VIII  THE FARM SCHEME                   88
     IX  THE ROTATION OF CROPS            101
      X  THE EQUIPMENT                    109
     XI  HOW TO ESTIMATE PROFITS          117
    XII  GRAIN AND HAY FARMING            135
   XIII  THE COST OF FARMING OPERATIONS   148
    XIV  THE PLACE OF INTENSIVE FARMING   162
     XV  REASONS FOR ANIMAL HUSBANDRY     172
    XVI  RETURNS FROM ANIMALS             185
   XVII  FARM LABOR                       195
  XVIII  SHIPPING                         210
    XIX  MARKETING                        220
     XX  LAWS AFFECTING LAND AND LABOR    233
    XXI  RURAL LEGISLATION                248
   XXII  RURAL FORCES                     268

                          THE YOUNG FARMER:
                     SOME THINGS HE SHOULD KNOW

                              ----------

                              CHAPTER I

                        ESSENTIALS OF SUCCESS

Columella, the much traveled Spanish-Roman writer of the first century
A. D., said that for successful farming three things are essential:
knowledge, capital and love for the calling. This statement is just as
true today as it was when written 1900 years ago by this early writer
on European agriculture.

Every man who loves the calling and has an ambition to become a
successful farmer should understand that no two of these essentials
are sufficient, but that all three are necessary. Although this is so
simple as to be almost axiomatic, it is indeed surprising how few
people believe a knowledge of farming is really essential to success.

America is strewn with cases of failure, in farming, by men investing
capital acquired in other business. In nine cases out of ten failure
has been due to lack of knowledge of farming.

There is known to the writer an expert mineralogist and metallurgist.
On the subject of coal and gold mining he can give the most valuable
information. His advice is constantly sought on all such matters.
Instead of investing his money in mining, on which he is a recognized
authority, he has invested it in a farm, about which he knows next to
nothing. He has not even had the advantage of being raised on a farm,
since his father was a railroad man.

A mechanical engineer remarked that if he had $25,000 he would invest
it in a farm. This man is supposed to be an expert in business methods
as applied to manufacturing in general, and he is especially
conversant with the manufacture and trade in automobiles. About all he
has seen of farming he has observed from the window of a Pullman car
or from the steering wheel of an automobile. Instead of investing his
earnings in some manufacturing business, about which he has spent
years of study and in which he has had some training, he would invest
it in farming, of which he has only the most rudimentary knowledge, if
only he had sufficient capital. As a matter of fact, he is more in
need of knowledge than of capital.

Even farmers of experience do not always realize the training required
to succeed in farming. A letter was received by the dean of a certain
agricultural college saying that a graduate of another agricultural
college had taken one of the poorest farms in his neighborhood and was
raising better potatoes than anyone else could raise. The letter asked
that information be sent by return mail as to how this young man could
be beaten in raising potatoes. Of course the answer had to be sent
that while information upon raising potatoes could easily be supplied,
although not in the limits of an ordinary letter, the training in
observation, judgment and reasoning faculties essential to meet the
daily problems as they arise could not be supplied.

There is no objection to men of other vocations adopting farming as an
avocation if they can afford it. It is a rational form of pleasure for
wealthy people, and one in which they can often be of great service.
This cannot be said of all forms of relaxation. Wealthy men have been
of special service to the cause of agriculture by promoting the
breeding of improved live stock. Men in other callings should clearly
understand, however, that if they have a farm merely as a place to
spend a week end, that they may expect to find the financial returns
unsatisfactory.

To no one is there more significance in the old school aphorism
"knowledge is power" than to the young man who is to become a farmer.
While it is not necessary to be educated in schools in order to gain
knowledge, yet the schoolroom with all its limitations is usually the
most economical and most efficient method of acquiring certain forms of
knowledge essential to every successful man or woman. A farm-to-farm
canvass of a certain region of the state of New York discloses the fact
that farmers with college training are obtaining a higher income from
their farms than those whose school days ended with high school.
Similarly, those who have finished the high school are more prosperous
financially than those who never advanced beyond the grades. The
investigation showed, for example, that with the farmers under
observation the high school education was equivalent to $6,000 worth of
5% bonds. Farming is an occupation requiring keen observation, sound
judgment and accurate reasoning, all attributes which are strengthened
greatly by proper education. This is so true that many men, perhaps
most men, are forty before they have grasped the problems which the
truly successful farmer must solve.

A considerable part of the knowledge essential to success in any
pursuit is acquired by actually working at the occupation, or, as we
say, by practical experience. Some features of any occupation can be
obtained in no other way. A preliminary education may, however,
greatly reduce the time necessary to acquire even this practical
experience. For example, a course in shop work as taught in technical
high schools and colleges, requiring two hours a day for five months,
may shorten the time of apprenticeship by one or more years, in
acquiring the trade of carpenter or iron worker. In the same manner a
course in butter making, cheese making or floriculture, may shorten
the time required to obtain the necessary practical details by ten
months or even more. Eventually, also, the man thus trained will be
the better man.

If the industrial activities of the world be divided into farming,
mining, manufacturing, trade and transportation, it will be noted at
once that farming is the only one which deals with living things. In
fact, the definition of agriculture, in its broadest sense, is the
economic production of living things. The farmer is thus brought face
to face with some of the most difficult and intricate problems with
which the human race has to grapple. It is this fact that makes
farming, in some ways, the most uncertain as well as the most
fascinating occupation known to man. The fact that the farmer is
dealing with living things puts his occupation in a class by itself
for a number of reasons, one of which is germane to the subject of
this chapter.

In most occupations a larger part of the knowledge necessary to success
can be acquired by doing than is the case in farming. Locomotive
engineers are trained for their responsible duty while firing the
engine. The brakeman becomes a conductor by assisting the latter. A
bank cashier is usually a promoted bank clerk. Each obtained the
knowledge essential to success largely by oft-repeated performance.

While, of course, there is much the farmer can learn only by
experience, there are many things essential to his success that the
mere performance of the necessary farm operations will not teach him.
Spreading manure will never teach him that stable manure should be
supplemented with phosphoric acid in order to get the best results. The
growing of clover will not teach him that mineral fertilizer may keep
up the fertility of the soil where clover grows luxuriantly and occurs
in the rotation at definite intervals. Feeding cattle will not teach
him that a good ration for milch cows is one containing one pound of
digestible protein to seven pounds of digestible carbohydrates,
provided it is palatable and, at least, two-thirds of the total ration
is digestible. Nor will the feeding of such a ration teach the farmer
how to calculate the most economical ration from feeding stuffs at
current prices. The cause of potato blight and the methods of combating
it cannot be learned from the operation of planting and cultivating
potatoes.

These are only a few illustrations--they might be multiplied
indefinitely--to show that farming is peculiar in that performance of
the daily duties does not give the knowledge essential to success in
the same measure that it does in such occupations as banking, trade
and transportation. Yet, curiously enough, while no man would
undertake to run a locomotive engine or perform the duties of cashier
of a bank without thorough training, there are many who will undertake
to farm without education or knowledge of the business.

The young man who intends to become a farmer should fully understand
that if farming is not a business worthy of a thoroughly educated man,
it is not a business worthy of him; because every young man is worthy
of a thorough education, provided he is a man of clean habits and good
purposes. Do not allow yourself to be persuaded that you lack ability
to acquire a good education. All you require is opportunity,
determination and honesty of intention.

Farming is worthy, moreover, of the most highly educated as well as
the most capable. If lack of means prevents a young man from taking a
four-years' training in agriculture, he will find a two years' course
offered by many of the state agricultural schools. While it is
obviously impossible to give in two years as much training as in four
years, these two years' courses contain the more technical subjects
and are usually very thorough and efficient. No young man, no matter
how thorough his previous training, need hesitate to pursue one of
them.

There are, however, young men who cannot spare the time and expense of
even two years' training. For such many state agricultural colleges
offer winter terms of eight to twelve weeks. These courses are
arranged to allow the student to specialize along some particular
line. The better prepared the man is who enters these winter courses
the more he will benefit by them. This leads to the caution that such
courses should not be substituted for the education offered in the
public schools, but should only be sought after all the opportunities
for education at home have been exhausted.

For the somewhat older young man who is now farming and cannot leave
his farm or for the younger man as a preparation for the short
courses, one or more correspondence courses will be found useful. Not
all colleges conduct correspondence courses, but fortunately those who
do will accept students from other states on equal terms. There are
many persons who will testify to their helpfulness.

Every young farmer should have a carefully selected library of
standard books on agriculture, not only for reading but for reference.
An instance of the value of a standard book of reference came recently
to the attention of the writer. An educated young farmer in Iowa paid
$2.50 for a peck of crimson clover seed which he sowed in the spring
in his oats. A reference to any standard publication on forage crops
costing less than the peck of seed would have disclosed to him the
probable hopelessness of success under the conditions named.

The books to include as well as to exclude from a select list will
depend upon the previous training of the man making the purchase, the
character of the farming to be pursued, and, to some extent, to the
section of the country where the farm is located. Any bookseller can
secure catalogs issued by firms making a specialty of publishing
agricultural books. For the average reader these catalogs are
sufficient to enable one to make intelligent purchases.

Every farmer should take one or more agricultural journals. At present
journals are published on every phase of agriculture and many of them
are of high character. Publishers are always glad to send sample
copies free of charge. By examining these copies intelligent selection
may be made.

The writer of this book has had rather unusual opportunity during more
than a quarter of a century of observing the influence of education
upon the success, financial and otherwise, of those who engage in
farming. As the result of these observations he wishes to urge every
young man to allow no one to persuade him that because he is to be a
farmer, he does not need a thorough education. Remember that you have
but one life to live, and if you let the golden opportunity pass, the
mistake can never be rectified. No man ever regretted that he had too
much education--thousands have regretted the lack of it.

Every young man, no matter what his occupation is to be, should
receive some school training, however little it may be, every year
until he reaches the age of majority. Otherwise the age of majority
should be changed. In no occupation is this more important than in
farming, because the operations involved in farming fail to develop
certain attributes necessary to the largest success.

A man cannot have a mind too well trained, although it is possible
that he may have too much undigested information. The mental condition
may not be unlike the physical condition of the man who is burdened
with too many clothes. When in action he may need to strip his mind of
unnecessary information in order to make the most efficient mental
effort.

                              CHAPTER II

                       MEANS OF ACQUIRING LAND

Of the three essentials to successful farming--capital, knowledge and
love for the calling--only the first can be obtained on credit, and
this only in part. Usually when a man desires to buy a farm he must
have, at least, one-third of his desired investment in cash. The
amount to be invested will include, not only the cost of the land, but
the cost of the necessary equipment of the farm. The percentage of the
total capital which may be borrowed, however, will depend on many
circumstances and is usually a matter of first importance. No man
should borrow more than a banker or other reputable business man
considers a safe investment.

Usually there is no better counselor as to a safe investment than the
local banker. The banker should, and generally does, stand in much the
same relation to the financial welfare of the community as the
physician to its physical, the minister to its moral and spiritual
welfare. The inexperienced person, even if he does not need to borrow
money, would do well to consult some responsible banker in the
neighborhood before making an investment in farm lands.

The young man should, as early as possible in life, open an account
with the local bank, not merely for the sake of the habit of saving
which this will encourage, but in order to come into personal business
relations with the banker. Instead of concealing from the bank his
business operations, he should seek the advice of his banker on all
important financial matters.

On an average, every farm changes hands at least three times in a
century. Every farm, therefore, must be acquired by purchase,
inheritance or gift at more or less irregular intervals. In the
neighborhood in which the author was born, there is not a farm but has
changed hands since he can remember. In many cases the farm is now in
the possession of a son; in some instances in that of a grandson of
the owner as known by the writer in his boyhood days. In this
particular community the acquirement of a farm by a person not related
to the former owner has occurred in relatively few instances.

As a rule, when the farm has been acquired by a son, the latter has
operated the farm as tenant or partner for a period previous to his
ownership and during lifetime of the father. In some instances the son
has boarded with the parents or the parents with the son and his wife;
or, in the case of a daughter, with the daughter and son-in-law.

Where there are several heirs, as is apt to be the case, the son
operating the farm is required to purchase or rent the interest of the
other heirs, unless the farm is large enough to be divided, which is
less seldom the case than is popularly supposed. Thus, if there are
200 acres of land worth $50 an acre, and five heirs, the young farmer
may inherit $2,000, and be required to assume the remaining $8,000 as
an obligation. He may borrow this money at the bank, placing a
mortgage upon the farm, thus settling with the other heirs at once. Or
he may pay the other heirs rent on their share of the farm. In any
case he will, if successful, gradually cancel his obligation and
become owner of the farm. That no heir is willing to assume this
responsibility is the most common reason for a farm changing from one
family to another, and the disruption of community interests.

The customary, or normal, method of acquiring land has been and still
is a combination of tenancy, inheritance and mortgage. Without some
tenant system and without the farm mortgage, it would be impossible
for the average young man to acquire a farm. That men are constantly
advancing from farm tenant to landowner is shown by statistics giving
the percentage of tenants by ages. The majority of farmers under 30
are renters. Most farmers over 45 are owners of farm land. Thus in
Illinois, in 1900, approximately 75% of the farmers under 25 years of
age rented their farms, while less than 20% of the farmers over 55
years of age were tenants.

The question for the young man to consider is not what effect the
tenant system has upon the welfare of the nation or what political
ills may be connected with farm mortgages, but how to make use of
these necessary and beneficent agencies for the acquirement of a farm.
A system of tenancy which leads to absent landlordism and a permanent
tenant class is thoroughly vicious, while a practice which enables a
man to become, within a reasonable period, a land-owning farmer is a
thoroughly approvable and, indeed, necessary method of acquiring land.

As already indicated, most young men will need in some form or other
to employ more capital than they possess when they start farming. They
must, therefore, determine what is the best form of obtaining the
necessary capital, viz.: whether to borrow the money on a farm
mortgage, or whether to use the capital someone else has invested in a
farm by paying him rent for it. The conditions of tenancy in this
country are often not the most fortunate, yet the young man of
character may well find, for a time, at least, it would be best for
him to rent a farm and invest his own capital in the necessary
machinery and live stock to conduct it properly.

Much will depend on the character of the arrangement which may be
made. Usually more favorable terms can be secured from landlords
owning large numbers of farms than from the owner of one or two farms.
The large landowner is content with a moderate income from each farm,
because in the aggregate his income is sufficient for his needs, while
the retired farmer who must live off the proceeds of a single farm is
apt to drive a hard bargain and may not be over particular concerning
the maintenance of said farm. The writer knows a farmer who owns a
good farm purchased from the proceeds of a rented farm. He continues
to live on the rented farm and rents his own, because, it is said, his
landlord is willing to make him more favorable terms than he makes to
his tenant.

The more capable the tenant the more favorable the terms he may exact.
Certain tenants are in demand and can have their choice of farms. A
prosperous-looking man was pointed out recently as an example of a
tenant capable of buying a farm in one of the most highly developed
counties in the United States. It was stated that as a renter he could
have his choice of any farm in the county, but that he did not have a
dollar invested in farm land. Possibly he invests his surplus earnings
in stocks and bonds.

It is not the present purpose to determine the relative merits of the
different systems of land tenure, but to try to be helpful to the
beginners by discussing the usual practices in order that he may know
whether the arrangement he is considering is customary and whether it
is likely to prove satisfactory.

Every third farm in the United States is rented under one of three
methods:

1. A definite money rent may be paid, ranging from $2 to $6 an acre
for land on which the ordinary, staple crops are raised. Perhaps $3 to
$4 is more commonly paid for such land.

2. In the South it is common for the landlord to require a definite
number of pounds of cotton per acre or a certain number of bales of
cotton for a one or two-mule farm, as the case may be. This is
classified by the census authorities as "cash rent," but will here be
called "crop rent." Crop rent is less common than either cash or share
rent in the northern and western states, although perhaps the most
common form in the South. Crop rent, however, is met with in some
sections, as in western New York where certain large landowners
require a definite number of bushels of wheat, oats or maize and make
certain stipulations as to hay and straw. They charge a cash rent for
pasture.

3. Much the most common form of tenancy, however, is that where a
certain percentage or share of the product is given the landlord for
the use of the land.

Before entering into a discussion of the customary conditions under
which land is rented on shares it may be helpful to point out the
fundamental differences between cash rent, crop rent and share rent.
In case of cash rent, the landlord takes no risk, either as to the
price or the amount of product. In the case of crop rent, he shares
the risk as to the variation in price, but not as to the amount of
crop raised. The latter may depend upon the clemency of the weather or
upon the industry and skill of the tenant. In the case of share rent,
both landlord and tenant share equally as to variation in the price
and the amount of product.

Three forms of share rent may be recognized:

(a) Where landlord furnishes only real estate (land and buildings),
the tenant supplying everything else, including teams, machinery,
labor, seeds and fertilizers. Under these conditions it is customary
for the landlord to receive one-third and the tenant two-thirds of the
crop raised or the product produced.

(b) The second form of share rent is where the landlord furnishes the
real estate; the tenant supplies teams, tools and labor, while the
landlord and tenant own equally all live stock other than teams, and
bear equally all other expenses, as for seeds, fertilizers and cost of
threshing. Under this system, it is customary for landlord and tenant
each to receive one-half of all sales. As each owns one-half of all
the live stock (teams excepted), each shares equally in all increase.
The landlord pays for the cost of permanent improvements such as new
buildings, fences, repairs and drainage. The tenant, in making these
improvements, in some cases, agrees to furnish two days' labor for one
day's pay. The theory is that, while the increased value of the real
estate is of advantage only to the landlord, the improved facilities
are of some benefit to the tenant. Since he can do this work at odd
times when not otherwise employed, he can afford to take a generous
view of the matter. It is obvious that if he remains on the farm long
enough the tenant will come into his share of the benefit, while if he
intends to leave the farm soon he may not. There is in the mind of the
writer a prosperous tenant who, after eighteen years on a single farm,
declared he had no desire to make a change, and doubtless there are
thousands of similar instances.

Under the plan in which the tenant furnishes everything except the
real estate, the tendency of the farm is apt to be downward both as to
the improvements and the crop-producing power of the soil. The
interests of the landlord and tenant are not mutual. This condition of
tenancy leads to growing only those crops which can be readily sold
from the farm and to frequent changes of the tenant, with its
accompanying auction sales of property. In one region, where this
system prevails, it has been facetiously remarked that each tenant has
a sale every year to determine how much he is worth. It is less
trouble than taking an inventory.

In the second form of share rent, the interests of landlord and tenant
are more nearly mutual. Under this system, animal husbandry is
possible, which, generally, involves pasturing and feeding a
considerable part of the crops upon the farm, and even the purchase of
nitrogenous by-products. All this leads to permanency of tenant, since
the landlord and tenant are both interested in the live stock and
other personal property, which cannot be divided, with economy, each
year. It is interesting to note that the house is the least likely to
be kept in repair. The improvement of the barns and fences or the
laying of tile drains increases the landlord's income, but he has no
financial interest in the house, so long as the tenant is willing to
live in it.

There are, of course, many variations in the arrangement of details
between the landlord and tenant. On many dairy farms in the northeastern
states it is customary for the landlord to own the cows. While the
landlord and tenant share equally from the sale of milk, butter or
cheese, in such cases the increase in the herd belongs to the owner of
the land. Hence, money from the sale of any animal, old or young, goes
to him. This is because the landlord must keep up the herd. If a cow is
sold, he must furnish another to take her place.

(c) The third type of tenant farming is where the tenant furnishes
nothing but his labor and managerial ability, and receives a share of
the sales, which may be one-third. This is rather an unusual type of
tenancy, since, where the landlord furnishes all the capital, it is
much more common to employ a farm manager at a monthly wage. The wage
varies greatly, but is seldom below forty dollars or above seventy-five
dollars per month without board, especially to those who have not
hitherto had much managerial experience.

Various attempts at profit sharing have been made. A recent instance
is of a young married man taking 160 acres of tillable land where the
landlord has a fairly well-stocked farm. The young man is to have a
house and everything in the way of living the farm can furnish. He is
to receive $20 a month and one-half the net proceeds, or, what is
called in Chapter XI, the farm income. In considering a contract of
this kind it is necessary to make a careful distinction between: (1)
Gross sales, (2) net proceeds, viz.: the gross sales less the expenses
of running the farm, and (3) profits, which may be defined for the
purpose of this discussion as the net proceeds less the interest on
the investment.[A]

Assuming 160 acres of land, all tillable, devoted to dairy farming in
eastern United States, gross sales may be estimated at $20 an acre, or
an annual gross income of $3,200, and the net proceeds at $10 an acre,
or $1,600. Under these conditions the young man's income would be
$240, received as wages, plus $800, as his share of the net proceeds,
or a total of $1,040 a year.

Generally speaking, probably a more satisfactory method, both for
landlord and the farm manager, would be to pay the latter as nearly as
may be what his services should be worth and give him in addition
one-half the profits; that is, one-half of that which was left after
deducting the expenses of running the farm and interest on the capital
invested.

Merely for illustrating the method of calculation, let us assume this
farm with its equipment to be worth $100 an acre, or $16,000. Let the
farm manager be paid $840 a year. Assume the same gross income,
$3,200, and the same cost of operating, $1,600, to which add $600, the
additional salary of the manager. The total expense is then $2,200,
and the net proceeds $1,000. If 4%, or $640, was charged on the
investment, there would be $360 to be divided between landlord and
manager, making the salary of manager $1,020. A simple calculation
will show that if 5% were charged, the salary of the manager would be
$940 a year, and if 6%, $860 a year. The advantage of the latter
method of employment is that the young man runs less risk, while both
receive equally any surplus beyond fair wages and fair interest on the
investment.

In this connection it is important to consider how much may be
reasonably paid for managerial ability. A study of the figures on page
133 will show that the labor income from a considerable number of
farms of the better class was about 7% of the capital invested in the
farms. The inference is, therefore, that if a man has $10,000 wisely
invested in a farm he may pay $700 for a working manager; or, to put
it in another form, before the owner of a farm can afford to pay
$1,200 a year for a farm manager, he should have about $17,000
invested. Moreover, this investment must be in a form calculated to
return an income. If part of it consists of investments for pleasure
or fancy, such investment will not only not add to the income, but
will detract from it by increasing the cost of maintenance.

This is scarcely less important to the employee than it is to the
employer, since if the owner pays a higher salary than the manager can
earn, he quite surely will sooner or later discharge his manager. This
may result disastrously for the discharged young man, not merely on
account of the loss of employment, but because his failure may
militate against his securing satisfactory employment elsewhere. When
an employer is seeking a man, he looks for one who has succeeded.
There is an old saying, "Nothing succeeds like success," and it is
only too true that nothing fails like failure.

-----

  [A] Profit is sometimes defined as that part of the product which
      the producer can consume without reducing his means of production.

                          FARM ORGANIZATION

In the last chapter were discussed the most common methods by which a
young man acquires an opportunity to engage in farming. This chapter
will discuss some less common arrangements by which may be bridged
that period between the time the son is ready to go into the business
and the time he may assume the complete control of the ancestral or
other farm. It will also suggest a method for the continuous business
management of a farm enterprise.

As stated, the most common reason for a farm changing from one family
to another is the fact that no heir is willing to assume the
obligation which is involved in paying for the interest of the other
heirs. Connected with this problem is the further fact that the father
is not usually ready to give up the management of the farm at the time
one of his sons reaches the age to go into active business.

The reason for this state of affairs is made clear by the results of
insurance statistics. The period that a man may be expected to live
can be obtained by taking the difference between his present age and
90 and dividing the remainder by two. Thus, a young man who is 20 may
reasonably expect to live 35 years, or until he is 55 years old. A man
at 50, however, still has an expectation of life of 20 years, and the
man of 70 of 10 years.

A farmer of 50 will usually have one or more sons ready to go to
farming if they ever expect to engage in farming. But, as has been
shown, a man of 50 has a reasonable expectation of 20 more years of
life and cannot turn over the farm to his son, completely, without
destroying his own opportunity for earning a livelihood. As things are
usually arranged, therefore, there is no place on the average farm for
the son, except as a hired hand, which is not desired permanently by
either father or son.

Frequently the father fails to appreciate the earning power of his
son, and, what is more important, that the boy has grown into a man.
One day a teacher called a student of agriculture to his office, when
the following conversation occurred:

[Illustration: John Armstrong, Austinburg, Ashtabula county, Ohio, was a
dairy tenant farmer for twenty years with nothing to show for his labor
but a debt of $500. He then bought the farm of 144 acres on which he
lives, without cash payment, assuming a debt of $7,000. At the end of ten
years he owned his farm and equipment valued at $20,000. He has two sons
who have been important factors in his success. A year ago one of them
married and went to a farm of his own, the father paying him $3,000 for
his former labor.]

[Illustration: John M. Hunt, Ackley, Iowa, two years a student at Iowa
State College. He returned to the home farm of 120 acres, which, without
any capital, he rented from his father. At the age of 25 his gross
receipts from this farm were a little over $4,000. After paying rent,
living, keeping a family of four, a few trips to fairs and corn shows,
he had net $1,500 for his year's work. Picture shows home with father,
mother and sister in the foreground.]

"The Bureau of Soils at Washington," said the teacher, "has asked me
to recommend several of our students to them for positions as field
assistants. If you desire to have me do so, I would be glad to
recommend you for one of these positions. The compensation is $1,000 a
year and field expenses."

"I do not believe that I can accept," said Mr. Manning, "my father is
in poor health and needs my help on the farm."

"Does your father want you to take charge of the farm and manage it so
that you can make your training count?"

"No; my father expects to continue to manage the farm. He wishes me to
work for him."

"How much does your father expect to pay you?"

"Thirty dollars a month."

The teacher found it extremely difficult not to interfere, but he
merely said, "This is a case of filial duty which you must settle for
yourself. I must have nothing further to say."

The young man returned to the ancestral home and is probably still
there. It is, of course, impossible to determine the merits of an
individual case, but this incident represents a type of cases where
the son makes two important sacrifices from the sense of duty.

First, he sacrifices present, and, perhaps, future opportunity to earn
the wages of which he is capable and to which he is justly entitled.
And, second, and more important, he sacrifices the opportunity to
develop his own powers and make concrete his own abstract self.

There are two things that every young man should do. One is to earn a
living. A man that cannot or does not earn a living is of no value to
himself or to anyone else. The other is to develop within himself his
latent possibilities. He must apply himself to some problem, or
problems, and through them develop his own personality. There is no
place where more intricate and satisfying problems may be found than
in the development of a successful farming enterprise. In the instance
cited, the father may have been unable to pay his son the wage he
might have obtained elsewhere, but he did not need to dwarf his son's
development by treating him merely as a hired hand. His willingness to
do so was probably due to his failure to appreciate that his son had
become a man.

Sometimes a father is astute enough to reorganize his business so as to
retain a place for himself while giving to his sons that opportunity
which every man must have who develops himself normally.

An Ohio farmer once came to the Dean's office. He had a son in college
who was just completing the first year of a two years' course in
agriculture.

"I should like to have you find a place for my son in a cheese factory
during the coming summer," said Mr. McKinley.

"I own a farm of 130 acres on which I have a herd of Jersey cattle,"
continued the father. "I have two sons and one daughter. I would like
to have my sons about me, but there is no place for them on my farm
because I am there and cannot get away. In fact, I do not desire to
give up the management of the farm and the development of the herd of
cattle."

"Not every father sees the situation as clearly as you do," interjected
the Dean.

"This is my plan. After my son has spent a summer in a cheese factory,
I want him to come back to your school for another year. I want him to
learn, especially, all you teach about dairying. I will then build a
cheese factory on my own farm and my son will make into cheese the
milk of my own herd, and also from the herds of our neighbors. By the
time he has completed his work with you, my younger son will have
finished the high school. He has some liking for trading, and he will
sell the cheese at wholesale and deliver it to the surrounding towns
where markets are unexcelled. As for the daughter," continued this
practical man, "she will get married and that will take care of her."

What became of the daughter is not known to the writer, but the rest
of the program was carried out successfully and continued for many
years.

A German came to this country and settled in New Jersey, where he
established a large orchard. In course of time his two sons grew into
manhood. While, of course, requiring plenty of laborers, the
orchardist did not need the sons in the management of his farm. He,
therefore, established one of these sons in the commission business in
Philadelphia, thus, at least, keeping the profits on the sale of the
products of his orchard in the family. He also needed cold storage for
his fruit. The other son started a cold storage plant, which plays an
important part in the profitable management of the orchard. Thus both
sons have independent employment requiring managerial ability and the
orchard is much more profitable than it otherwise would be.

Our land laws, our traditions and our practices are based upon the
idea that a farm is to provide activity and support for but one
family. In order, therefore, that the son may marry and begin to
develop his life in his own way, it is essential to reorganize in some
manner the method of managing the farm or to enlarge or, perhaps,
specialize its activities. This may be accomplished on a simple
partnership basis, or it may be in some such line as outlined in the
illustrations which have been given. In other occupations such
co-operative effort is the rule rather than the exception. That it is
more difficult to effect satisfactory arrangements in farming must be
conceded, else they would be more common. Doubtless it will often tax
the ingenuity of father and son to devise the plans best suited to
meet their particular problem.

There still remains to consider another form of business relation as
applied to farming which has become almost universal in trade and
transportation. The following incident may illustrate and emphasize
the problem better than abstract discussion: One day a man walked into
an office and stated that a friend had a half million dollars to
invest in farming, provided that he could be convinced that the money
would be invested profitably.

"Does your friend desire to buy land in any particular locality?"

"Yes," replied the promoter, "he wishes to buy land near ----. He has
some sentiment about it. He was born in that neighborhood."

"Well, that is a rather bad beginning. Farming on sentiment is
dangerous, especially when the sentiment is in no way related to the
business."

The facts were that the region indicated was recognized to be one of
the most unpromising sections of the state.

"If you undertake to invest a half million dollars in one neighborhood,"
continued the adviser, "you will pretty certainly fail to earn interest
on your investment."

"Why?" inquired the promoter.

"Before you could possibly buy any considerable part of the land the
owners of the farms you desire to buy would have doubled or perhaps
trebled the price asked for their holdings. It is one thing to earn
interest on an investment of $30 an acre and quite another to earn an
equal per cent on $60 or $90 an acre.

"In the second place, farmers are content to accept less per cent on
their capital than they would if it was loaned at interest, because
the farm furnishes a home as well as a business. When you buy up all
these farms and convert them into a single enterprise you will destroy
their home value. You cannot hope to compete with the man, who,
because his farm furnishes him a home, is content with an otherwise
small return on his investment."

There were other reasons, of course, why such an enterprise would
fail, which the speaker did not stop to explain.

"You are mistaken," challenged the promoter. "I intend to meet both
your objections. My plan is to form a corporation and issue both
preferred and common stock. The preferred stock shall bear 5% and that
will belong to my friend who furnishes the money. I will retain the
common stock. Five per cent is all the owner of the money is entitled
to, while if the business returns more than that amount, it will be
due to my management. I, and those associated with me, are entitled to
all that is made above five per cent. By retaining the common stock
the surplus income will come to us. Neither will I destroy the home
value, because I shall associate the former owners with me in the
conduct of the estate and may give them some of the common stock, so
that they will be interested with me in making a profitable return. If
they wish to keep their money invested in the farm, they will be given
preferred stock in place of cash for their farms."

It is needless to say that the promoter never convinced his friend
that he could successfully invest for him a half million dollars along
the lines indicated. Nevertheless the corporate plan is not without
merit. For example, if a father should incorporate his farm, he could
provide for the inheritance of the preferred stock, among the heirs,
as he desires. He could give to the son who operates the farm all the
common stock, together with what preferred stock he is entitled or the
father may desire him to have. The common stock would provide the
means by which the income from the farm, which was due to the sons
skill and management, might go to him. As time went on the son could
acquire additional preferred stock from the father or other heirs, or
he could invest his earnings elsewhere, as might seem most expedient.
On the death of the parents, the preferred stock would be distributed
as inheritance or the will provided without in any way interfering
with the continuity of the farm enterprise. If at any time the son
desired to discontinue the management of the farm, all he would need
to do would be to dispose of his interest in the common stock at
whatever he might be able to secure from the man who succeeded to its
management. He could sell or retain his preferred stock.

Farming is the one remaining great industry that has not been
organized so that a single enterprise may have a continuous existence.
A corporation never dies, but at least three generations of men occupy
the farms of the United States each century.

                              CHAPTER IV

                     OPPORTUNITIES IN AGRICULTURE

Some years ago, a prominent magazine contained an article entitled
"The American Farmer's Balance Sheet," in which a descendant of the
second and sixth Presidents of the United States was shown to have
made in one year a profit of over $19,000 from a 6,000-acre wheat farm
in North Dakota, and over $50,000 from a 6,000-acre corn farm in Iowa.
A few months later there appeared in the same magazine another
article, the purport of which was that great wealth, whether it be
obtained from farming, the mining of coal, the manufacture of steel or
the selling of merchandise, is the exception, while the man, in
whatever calling, who rears and educates a family and at the same time
lays by a small competence is the normal American product. The moral
is that a $500-a-year-income farm is a more important factor to the
national welfare than a $50,000-a-year-income farm.

In the latter article the writer tells of two brothers who had been
reared on a Michigan farm. Reuben was tired of the country. He went to
the city and apprenticed himself to a harnessmaker. Against the advice
of young friends, Lucien bought sixty acres of land and ran in debt
for it.

In a year Reuben was earning a dollar a day. He wore a white shirt and
pointed shoes, not because they were more comfortable, but because
other people did. He had no debts. Lucien had fair crops, but they
yielded no more than enough to pay interest on the mortgage. He wore a
ragged shirt, patched breeches and cowhide boots. People said that
Reuben was making a gentleman of himself and learning a trade in the
bargain.

In two years, Reuben had completed his apprenticeship. He was now
earning $10 a week. He lived in a house that had a fancy veranda and
green blinds. His clothing improved. Lucien was still ragged, but he
paid his interest and $300 each year upon the principal. People said
that Reuben, the harnessmaker, was bound to come to the front.

In ten years more, Reuben was still foreman of the shop at $50 a
month. He lived in the same house, and smoked Havana cigars. Lucien
built a new house and a barn. He smoked a pipe. The neighbors saw that
every year he made some improvement on the farm. He wore a white shirt
when he went to town, and he had a pair of button shoes. People said
that Lucien was becoming a prominent man. His word was good at the
bank.

Reuben began to complain that harnessmaking was too confining. His
health was breaking down. The proprietor was selfish. He would not die
and leave the business to him. Harnessmaking was not what it used to
be. Lucien bought more land. He went fishing when he wanted to. Reuben
came out now and then to spend Sunday. The birds seemed to sing more
sweetly than ever before and the grass was greener. Lucien endorsed
Reuben's note.

Lucien has pigs, and cows, and sheep, and chickens, and turkeys, and
horses. He raises potatoes and beans, and corn, and wheat, and garden
stuff, and fruit. He buys his groceries and clothing and tobacco.
Reuben buys everything. At the close of the year Lucien puts from $100
to $300 in the bank or takes a trip to Washington. Reuben does well if
he come out even. Lucien does not fret; Reuben grumbles.

The picture is true to life. It has been enacted and re-enacted in
every one of the older communities of the United States.

It has always seemed to the writer, however, that the author of this
suggestive story left out two important personages. They were Sarah,
the wife of Reuben, and Mary, the wife of Lucien. Sarah liked to make
tatting and to go to pink teas. Mary preferred to raise flowers and
fluffy little chickens. Nothing is to be said for or against the taste
of either. Each has a right to her preference, but their point of view
cannot be left out of the problem when a young man is considering his
future occupation.

It has been said, and probably with considerable truth, that most
congressmen would not hang around Washington if it were not for their
wives.

No one must mistake this story as an attempt to compare harness making
with farming, much less to compare living in the city with life in the
open country.

What it does is to compare the struggle and the development of the man
who goes into business for himself with the man who accepts employment
at wages.

Because of less responsibility and less sacrifices at the beginning,
the tendency is for young men to work for wages rather than to engage
in business for themselves. This is becoming more and more true as
industrial methods make it more and more difficult for the young man
to command the requisite capital.

The man who works for wages usually has the larger income and appears
the most prosperous during the earlier years as compared with his
brother who enters business. The business man, however, who, while
young, economizes and invests his savings in his business gradually
outstrips his wage-earning brother. During later life he is able to
enjoy the fruits of his earlier economy and investments, while failing
powers and keen competition of younger and better trained men restrict
the opportunities of the wage earner, who has generally spent his
wages in better living, or at least in more outward show.

This is well shown by the fact that it is customary to make provision
by means of pensions for wage earners of all sorts, while no such
arrangement is made for men who engage in business, be that farming,
trade or transportation.

For many reasons, however, young men will continue to seek employment
at wages, even if only for a few years, or until some capital has been
acquired which may be invested in business.

The question arises, therefore, what opportunities there may be for
the young man who desires to engage, eventually, in the business of
farming to work for wages along lines that will not be too far removed
from the business in which he is subsequently to engage. It will be
assumed that the young man has prepared himself in that same
painstaking way that he would if he were preparing to become an
engineer, a lawyer or a physician.

There is a constant demand for men with proper training as managers of
farms. As stated elsewhere, the wages are seldom less than $40 nor more
than $75 a month to beginners, although for men of experience $5,000 a
year has been paid in exceptional cases for the management of large
enterprises. These positions often constitute ideal opportunities for
capable young men. They require, however, not only an intimate
knowledge of farming, but the ability, also, to manage men.

The ability to manage men requires the combination of decision and
tact, not possessed by all, and not easily acquired by education or
practice. Not only must the farm manager be able to manage workmen,
but oftentimes he must manage his employer, who may have little
knowledge of farming but still insists upon having his own ideas
executed, as he, of course, has a perfect right to do.

Another danger is the fact that where the farm is owned by a man
engaged in other business, many circumstances may arise to cause the
owner to change his plans or sell his property. There is often,
therefore, a lack of permanency in these positions.

The United States Department of Agriculture employs upward of 5,000
people. There is a constant demand for young men to recruit this
service, including experts in soils, plant production, animal
husbandry, dairying, chemistry and forestry. Beginners receive from
$800 to $1,000 a year. When they are sent out of Washington into field
service, as many of them are, they receive their expenses, including
subsistence in addition. Young men may rise rather rapidly by
promotion to $1,600 a year, then more slowly to $2,000, while an
occasional man is promoted to the more responsible position paying
$3,000 to $4,000 a year.

The positions are all filled through the competitive civil service
examinations. Examinations are held at more or less irregular
intervals, usually several times a year, in various sections of the
country. A letter addressed to the United States Civil Service
Commission will secure the necessary information concerning openings
and the general requirements for the examinations.

Employment in the United States Department of Agriculture often
affords opportunity for varied experience and wide observation of
farming methods throughout the country. Such employment is generally
to be considered desirable if not continued for too long a period. As
a matter of fact, men are constantly leaving the service to engage in
practical or other work, a fact which makes the demand for young men
greater than would otherwise be the case.

The various agricultural colleges and experiment stations are
constantly seeking men. It would seem that the demand would eventually
be satisfied. As a matter of fact, however, it grows greater year by
year, both because these institutions continue to grow and because
young men are attracted more and more to practical work. It is stated
that in one institution there were 46 graduates in the course in
animal husbandry and that 44 went into practical work and only two
sought employment in college or station. The salaries are about the
same as in government positions.

Agricultural newspaper work offers an attractive field for young men
who are properly trained and have a taste for this kind of work.

There is also beginning to be quite a demand for teachers of
agriculture in the high schools. As a rule a man is wanted who can
teach, in addition, the sciences usually taught in secondary school.
The customary salary is from $70 to $100 a month on an eight to ten
months' basis. An experience of one or two years as a teacher in a
high school, or even the lower grades of the public school, should be
invaluable to the young man who expects subsequently to engage in
farming. This is particularly true if he has not had the opportunity
of a college training.

It is, perhaps, unnecessary to state that the salaries mentioned in
this chapter are obtained only by young men who possess certain
qualifications. To secure them, they must be men of ability,
integrity, virtue and industry. No man who is not willing to make the
preparation necessary to master his subject can expect to succeed. He
must, also, be a man of absolute honesty, and he must lead a clean
life. It was Bismarck who said, of German university students,
"One-third die out; one-third rot out; the other third rule Germany."
Every man who will may choose whether he will belong to Bismarck's
second or third class.

The question for the young man of 20 is not merely as to the morrow,
but what is likely to be the trend of events during the next 35 to 50
years.

"In 1800 the United States nowhere crossed the Mississippi and nowhere
touched the Gulf of Mexico." In 1850 the country west of the
Mississippi River was agriculturally largely an undiscovered region.
Since 1870 we have much more than doubled our population and our
agriculture. Since that time we have subdued more of the open country
to the uses of man than we had been able to do in 250 years of our
previous history.

During the past 300 years we have prided ourselves upon being an
agricultural people. We have been an agricultural people, but our
problems have not been chiefly those of the agriculturist, but those
of the engineer.

Our problem, in the past, has not been to make two blades of grass to
grow where but one grew before. Our problem has been to harvest and
transport two bushels of wheat or two bales of cotton with the labor
previously required to harvest one. Our crops have been so abundant
that the agricultural problems connected with the growing of them has
been secondary to the engineering problems of their harvesting and
transportation. The self-binder and the steam locomotive have been our
achievements.

If the writer mistakes not, the future problem will not be so much the
harvesting and transporting, as the growth of the crops. In the
future, young men will be needed who have studied the science of
living things in order that they may make, literally, two blades of
grass to grow where but one grew. To men who will be able to do so,
will come success and honor.

                              CHAPTER V

                           WHERE TO LOCATE

Unless the young farmer expects to return to the ancestral home, the
first question he must settle is where he is going to locate. Indeed,
one of the most common questions asked is, What do you think of this
state or that state or this region or that as a place to farm? There
are few questions harder to answer. This is due, among other reasons,
to the fact that every place has its advantages and disadvantages. The
sum of the advantages may be greater in one place than in another, but
if these advantages are known they must generally be paid for.

New adaptations, however, may change materially the value of the land
in a given locality as, for example, the discovery that a region is
especially adapted to raising alfalfa, onions, cabbages, apples or
peaches. Changing conditions, as the growth of population or better
transportation facilities, may materially affect the attractiveness of
a region from the standpoint of the farmer.

The competition of other regions which grow similar crops is a potent
factor in determining the desirability of a region. For example, the
farmers east of the Allegheny mountains during the nineteenth century
competed with the farmers of the central West who had free, fertile,
easily tilled land on which to grow maize, wheat and oats. Cattle and
sheep were pastured on the open range. The twentieth century has found
the land of this region settled and capitalized in some instances
beyond that of the eastern states; thus one factor at least of
competition has been eliminated.

While farm values readjust themselves in time, it often happens,
especially in the older settled regions, that farm values are slow in
reflecting these changes in economic conditions. Changed conditions
often call for a change in farm methods which the habits and
traditions of even one generation prevent. To the man who is able to
apply the proper methods the region may be a desirable one, although
under existing conditions the results may be unsatisfactory. The young
man, however, is cautioned at this point not to be overconfident of
his own ability. Under such circumstances it is well to study the
problem with great care, because the methods which seem unwise to the
casual observer may, after all, be found to be based upon sound
economic principles.

A man of 25 who is looking for a location should not only study the
present conditions of the locality, but try to predict what is likely
to be the future of the region during the next third of a century,
since this is the period in which he may reasonably expect to be
personally interested, although later in life he will find himself
quite as much interested in the more distant future on account of his
children.

Nothing is more self-evident than that one should choose a region,
especially as regards soil and climate, which is adapted to the crop
or crops to be raised, yet there are probably more failures due to a
lack of crop adaptation than to any other cause that is not personal
to the man himself. Not only do apples, for their best success,
require certain soil types, but different varieties of apples require
for their best development, distinctly different types of soil as, for
example, Rhode Island Greening, Baldwin, York Imperial and Grime's
Golden. Each reaches its best development on different types of soil
and some require different climatic conditions. In like manner apples
and peaches require distinctly different types of soil for the best
success of each and for this reason peaches are not desirable as
fillers in apple orchards.

If at the proper season of the year one goes from Pittsburg to Chicago
via Columbus and Indianapolis, he will see great fields of winter
wheat and a considerable number of permanent pastures. From Chicago to
Omaha he will see only occasionally a field of wheat and scarcely any
permanent pasture. Oats have taken the place of wheat. In parts of
Eastern Kansas and Oklahoma the predominant crop is winter wheat.
Throughout the whole region from Pittsburg to Topeka, Kansas, the
characteristic crop is maize or Indian corn. Between St. Paul and
Fargo, the main crops are spring wheat and oats. One may travel from
Winnipeg, Manitoba, to Calgary, Alberta, a distance of over one
thousand miles without seeing a field of maize. In some portions the
main crop is wheat, in others it is oats.

These are illustrations of the crop adaptation over large areas, which
has come about unconsciously, as has most crop adaptation. In other
parts of the United States are to be found even more striking examples
of crop adaptation, although the areas are much smaller, as in the
case of tobacco, potatoes, celery, onions, apples, peaches and other
fruits. Regions containing residual soils are more variable in crop
adaptation than drift soils and require more careful watchfulness on
the part of those who may wish to buy land.

As previously stated, advantages, if known, must usually be paid for.
It comes about, therefore, that if a region or a farm is adapted to
the raising of a certain crop which is more profitable than the
average, such as maize, tobacco, alfalfa, celery, apples or peaches,
this land will, other things being equal, command a higher price than
land which does not possess this characteristic.

There is an underlying economic principle which the man who goes out
to choose a farm should clearly understand. The principle has been
stated by Fairchild as follows: "The normal value of products capable
of indefinite multiplication tends always toward the value of least
costly. On the other hand, if any production cannot be largely
extended, so that the supply barely meets the requirements of the
purchasers, the tendency of normal values is toward the cost of the
most costly part of the product required to meet wants."

This principle explains why land especially adapted to raising maize
is higher priced than land primarily adapted to raising wheat. Maize
which enters into commerce is raised almost exclusively in ten states
of the United States. Wheat is harvested practically every month of
every year in different parts of the world. The young farmer should
consider, therefore, whether he is undertaking to raise crops in which
there is unlimited competition, or whether soil or other conditions
cause the output to be relatively limited.

                              CHAPTER VI

                             SIZE OF FARM

The size of the farm is another of those questions on which there is
endless debate and to which no general answer can be given. There are,
however, certain rather definite principles which may help in settling
an individual problem.

The size of the farm is related to the income per acre. If one's ideal
or purpose is a gross income of $1,000 or $3,000 or $5,000 a year, he
must consider how large a farm will be necessary to bring this return.

Assume, for the sake of discussion, it is desired to obtain a gross
income of $4,000. In the eastern United States 200 acres of tillable
land devoted to general farming may bring this amount. If the land is
especially adapted to potatoes, and this crop takes a prominent place
in the rotation, 100 acres might be sufficient to return the income
named. Likewise a 100-acre retail milk dairy farm may produce a
similar result. Forty acres devoted to truck farming or market
gardening may be sufficient.

There is another way that the size of the farm needed may be
estimated. There is a general relation between the gross income and
the amount invested. In 1900 the gross income of the farms of the
United States was 18 per cent of the total investment, which includes
land, buildings, tools, and live stock. The average gross income
varied for the different types of farming common to the northern
United States from 16 to 19 per cent. This represents, of course, a
great deal of very poor farming. The income of prosperous farmers must
be somewhat better than this. If we assume that by careful methods the
gross income is 25% of the total investment, then an investment of
$16,000 will be required to bring a gross income of $4,000. While it
is true that the gross income has no necessary relation to net income
or profit, yet it is well to remember that a gross income is a
necessary antecedent of a net income. The net profit from the
production of a bushel of wheat, a dozen of eggs, or a pound of butter
is of comparatively small consequence unless a sufficient quantity is
produced.

A recent investigation by the Cornell station appears to show that
with the type of farming now existing in Tompkins and Livingston
counties, New York, where the investigation chanced to be made, the
larger farms yielded the most profitable returns and that while
present conditions exist, the size of farms is likely to increase
rather than decrease. The fundamental reason seems to be the
substitution of horse-drawn machinery for hand labor.

The following table shows the labor income on 586 farms operated by
the owners, classified according to size:

                 Number    Average
                  of        size     Labor
       Acres     farms    (acres)   income
    30 or less    30        21       $168
    31 to 60     108        49        254
    61 to 100    214        83        373
    101 to 150   143       124        436
    151 to 200    57       177        635
    over 200      34       261        946
                          ----       ----
    Average                103       $415

While the larger the farm, the more prosperous was the operating owner
or tenant, the size of the farm did not seem to affect the profit of
the landlord.

The amount of land one individual may own is unlimited; the size of
the farm unit is limited. After a farm unit has reached a certain
size, depending upon the type of farming, the general arrangement of
the farm and the skill in management, any further increase will
increase the cost of operation, and as the increase continues
eventually cause a decrease in profits. Assuming this to be true, it
follows as a mathematical necessity that as the farm increases in size
the total profits will increase as the farm increases up to a given
point and then the profits will decrease. The following table
illustrates this law:

    Size of              A                        B
    farm      Net profit   Net profit   Net Profit   Net Profit
    acres     per acre     per farm     per acre     per farm
    160         $5.00        $800         $5.00        $800
    200          4.50         900          4.75         950
    240          4.00         960          4.50       1,080
    280          3.50         980          4.25       1,190
    320          3.00         960          4.00       1,280
    360          2.50         900          3.75       1,350
    400          2.00         800          3.50       1,400
    440          1.50         660          3.25       1,430
    480          1.00         480          3.00       1,440
    520           .50         260          2.75       1,430
    560           --          --           2.50       1,400

In both case A and case B it is assumed that the greatest net profit
per acre is to be obtained with 160 acres, and that the net profit per
acre when the farm is of that size is $5. In case A it is assumed that
the net profit would decrease $1 for each 80 acres added, while in
case B the decrease is assumed to be only one-half as rapid. In the
first instance the net profit per farm increases until 280 acres are
reached, when the net profit per farm decreases, until at 560 acres no
profit would be obtained. In case B the net profit per farm increases
until 480 acres are reached. Everyone is cautioned not to accept these
figures as representing what would actually happen. All that can be
said is that as the farm unit increases in size there will come a
point at which the net profit per acre will decrease because of the
physical difficulty of managing a large area, and, therefore, there is
a limit to the size of a single farm. Fifteen thousand acres may lay
in one tract and be owned by one individual, firm or corporation, but
its economic management requires for purely physical reasons, not to
mention others, that it be managed in several units more or less
distinct from one another. Just what the size of this unit will be no
one knows and it will vary with the type of farming, the type of
farmer and many other circumstances. For example, a very common unit
for a tenant cotton farm is between 20 and 50 acres, both the product
and the farmer being a limiting factor.

Perhaps the most important lesson to be learned from a study of this
table is that it is wise for some men to operate a farm of 320 acres,
others of 160 acres and still others of 80 acres, because each size of
farm presents a task suited to different abilities. It would be as
futile for one fitted to operate only an 80-acre farm to attempt to
manage 320 acres as it would be unwise for the man capable of conducting
320 acres to confine his attention to 80 acres. Unfortunately while this
principle is not difficult to perceive and is easily stated, it is
practically impossible to make any application of it to an individual
case. Only time and the inexorable laws of competition will adjust men
to their several tasks.

It will be of interest to note what influence in actual practice the
type of farming has upon the size of the farm. The census reports the
average size of all farms in the United States as 147 acres, with the
different types as follows: Vegetables, 65 acres; fruits, 75 acres;
dairy products, 120 acres; hay and grain, 159 acres; and live stock,
227 acres. Speaking in a very general way, only about one-half the
land on these farms is in cultivated crops, while only 40% of the
income may be from the products which cause the farm to be thus
classified. The young farmer will do well to have these figures in
mind when he starts out in life, for while they are not to be followed
literally, they give him a measuring stick with which to compare his
operations.

                             CHAPTER VII

                          SELECTION OF FARM

Having some of these preliminary questions settled, or at least well
in mind, the young farmer is ready to inspect individual farms with a
view to purchasing or renting. He should examine each farm from four
general aspects, namely: (1) The character and topography of the soil,
(2) the climatic conditions, including healthfulness and water supply,
(3) the location, and (4) the improvements.

It may be well at the outset to emphasize the advantage which even a
small difference in fertility may bring. Suppose one farm is capable
of raising fifteen bushels of wheat per acre and another twenty
bushels. If wheat is 80 cents a bushel, then the gross income is $12
and $16 respectively. If it is assumed that it costs in either case
for seed, labor and interest on investment $8 an acre to raise and
harvest the crop, then it will be seen that an increase of five
bushels an acre doubles the profit. The comparison is perhaps not
quite fair, since it costs slightly more to harvest the larger crop,
but it serves to illustrate the point.

Neither the crop adaptation nor the crop-producing power of the soil
can be determined by taking a sample and submitting it to a chemist
for analysis. These factors can best be determined by the character of
the vegetation, both domestic and wild, and by a knowledge obtained
through observation or reading as to what this particular soil type
usually does. Every type of soil has certain characteristics which
under like conditions it may be expected to reproduce, much in the
same manner as each species of animal reproduces its characteristics.

The first essential is to be able to recognize the different soil
types. This can only be done by close observation and study. The second
essential is to determine what the crop-producing characteristics of
these types of soil are. This knowledge may be obtained by personal
observation; but as most persons' opportunities are limited in this
direction, it should be supplemented wherever possible by a study of
the soil surveys of the United States Department of Agriculture
wherever these are available. When this is not possible samples of soil
may be submitted to the Bureau of Soils of the United States Department
of Agriculture or to the soil division of the state experiment station,
together with a suitable description and such knowledge of the history
of the land as is obtainable. In this way you may obtain information as
to the natural adaptation of the particular type of soil.

[Illustration: Walter S. Tomlinson, Bryan, Ohio, began thirteen years
ago with 225 acres, partly rented, to determine whether a farm could be
made a satisfying enterprise. As tenant he has paid to himself as
landlord $1,000 each year for rental and $500 each year as salary. The
rest of the profits have been invested in 240 acres of additional land
and in improvements. Mr. Tomlinson's specialty has been hogs, but he
says it does not matter so much about the lines one adopts as the
attention that is given them.]

[Illustration: Dr. W. I. Chamberlain, Hudson, Ohio, graduate of Western
Reserve University, former state secretary of agriculture, later college
president. Farmer and institute lecturer and widely known for his
editorial work on farm journals; has been able, amid his other
activities, to manage his farm of 116 acres. The net cash income above
all expenses from the farm for 1890 to 1907 was $113,966 or $1,370 per
year. Of this income $8,877 were obtained from a ten-acre apple orchard.]

There will still remain the question of the present condition of the
land. For example, the Pennsylvania station obtained in a certain
season 42 loads of hay from nine acres of land. The same season, from
exactly the same soil type, the station obtained eight loads of hay
from 20 acres. The condition of the soil was different, which the
previous history of the two tracts of land fully explains.

It is of the utmost importance, therefore, to distinguish between the
natural fertility of the soil and the condition of the soil. A further
example will help to illustrate this point. At the Rothamsted Station
a certain type of soil has for over 60 years produced annually about
12 bushels of wheat an acre without fertilizer, while with a complete
fertilizer the same type has produced 30 or more bushels. The 12
bushels may be said to represent the natural fertility of the soil,
while the additional 18 bushels may be said to represent the condition
of the soil due to fertilizers or to other conditions. On the other
hand, the natural condition of some other soil type might be only
eight bushels, or still another type might be 16 bushels.

This principle is of considerable practical importance, especially in
the eastern third of the United States. Generally speaking, clay and
silt soils have a greater natural fertility than sandy soils;
limestone soils than those that are deficient in lime. Thus soils that
naturally grow chestnut trees, indicating a low lime content, have a
tendency to deteriorate under exhaustive cropping much more rapidly
than limestone soils. More fertilizers and other methods of soil
improvement are necessary in the case of chestnut soils than in the
case of limestone valley soils. One of the first questions to ask,
therefore, concerning an unknown farm in Pennsylvania is whether or
not chestnut trees grow naturally. It does not follow, however, that
chestnut soils are undesirable. Much will depend upon the crop or
crops it is desired to raise. For example, in some regions they are
well adapted to potatoes and peaches. In these cases the cost of the
fertilizers necessary to keep the soil in proper condition is small
compared with the total return from the crop.

The pioneer's best guide as to the value of new land was and is the
vegetation growing upon it, and, especially in a wooded country, the
native trees. Basswood, crab apple, wild plum, black walnut, ash,
hickory and hard maple generally indicate a fertile soil. White oak
indicates only a moderate soil; bur oak, a somewhat warmer and better
drained soil. Beech indicates a rather poor soil; a heavy clay,
lacking in organic matter. Certain species of elms, maples and oaks,
as red maple and the Spanish swamp oak, indicate wet soils.

The occurrence and vigor of certain herbaceous plants are especially
indicative of fertility of the soil, as, for example, ragweed,
bindweed, certain plants of the sunflower family, such as goldenrod,
asters and wild sunflowers. Soils adapted to red clover and alfalfa are
usually well drained and contain plenty of lime. Alsike clover will
grow on a soil too wet or containing too little lime for either of the
former. Soils that produce sorrel and redtop when red clover and
timothy are sown need drainage or liming or both. Sedges usually
indicate a wet soil, although certain species grow on dry, sandy soils.
The point of this paragraph, however, is not to give comprehensive
advice but to cause the young farmer to observe the conditions and make
his own applications, which will vary in different regions and under
different circumstances.

Perhaps the one feature that the young farmer is most likely to
overlook in the selection of a farm is the relative proportion of
tillable land. One farm of 200 acres, may, on account of stony land,
wet land, comparatively unproductive woodland, or because of the
arrangement of fences and roadways, contain only eighty acres of
tillable land, while another may contain 160 acres. This is one reason
why a 160-acre farm in the central West may be more valuable than a
farm of the same size in the northeastern United States.

Columella says with regard to the selection of land that there are two
things chiefly to be considered, the wholesomeness of the air and the
fruitfulness of the place, "of which if either the one or the other
should be wanting, and notwithstanding anyone should have a mind to
dwell there, he must have lost his senses and ought to be conveyed to
his kinfolk to take care of him."

In selecting a farm do not fail to inquire whether there has been any
recent illness, and if so the nature of it, either among the persons
living there or the domestic animals kept.

Aside from healthfulness, climate is a fundamental and controlling
factor, both in productiveness and economic farm management.
Temperature and rainfall affect the number of days that work can be
performed upon the land and hence affect materially the economy of
labor. It is this fact that prevents the systematic organization of
labor so common in manufacturing and transportation. The climate also
affects the cost of producing live stock by modifying the food and
shelter required.

The climate of a region is best studied from the reports of the United
States Weather Bureau rather than from the statements published by
interested parties. So far as the production of crops is concerned the
distribution of rainfall is more important than the annual amount, as
may be shown by comparing the rainfall in such places as Columbus,
Ohio, and Lincoln, Nebraska.

The average temperature during the growing season is, of course, of
more importance from the standpoint of crop production than the
average annual temperature. Maximum and minimum temperatures or the
range of temperature must be considered as well as the average
temperature.

One of the most practical questions to determine is the average date
of the last killing frost in the spring and the date of the first
killing frost in the autumn; in other words, the length of the growing
season. Both altitude and topography enter into this problem. In a
given locality killing frosts will occur on a still night in the
valley before they do on the elevations, because the air as it cools
becomes heavier and flows down into the lowest places just as water
would do. On the other hand, as the altitude increases the growing
season shortens.

Whenever I am asked a question involving the production of farm crops
by a Pennsylvania farmer before answering, I ask three questions: (1)
Where are you located? (2) Do chestnut trees grow naturally upon your
land? (3) What is your altitude?

One factor that is often overlooked by the young farmer needs only to
be mentioned to be thoroughly appreciated. It is the amount and
character of the water supply. Not only is this of the utmost
importance from the standpoint of the household, but it is fundamental
to the best farm management. Thus, if the water supply is limited the
amount of live stock kept will be curtailed, and thus the proper
utilization of farm products prevented and maintenance of the
fertility of the soil made more difficult.

The young farmer should recognize that some kinds of farming are more
dependent upon the climatic conditions than others and should,
therefore, select the location best suited to the type of farming
desired or else modify his type of farming to suit the climatic
conditions. If one studies critically the types of farming in various
parts of the United States, it will be seen that they have already
been adjusted in large degree, either consciously or unconsciously, to
the climatic conditions. The young farmer should be careful that he
does not undertake to butt his head against a stone wall.

Having found a farm that suits our ideal as to the natural conditions,
such as the crop adaptation, fertility, topography and climate, what
may be called the artificial conditions must be studied.

The location may be studied, both as to local and distant markets and
the means of reaching each, which includes roadways and shipping
facilities. Here again much will depend upon the products which are to
be sold. The man who raises tobacco, hogs or beef cattle does not
suffer any great economic disadvantage by living ten miles from a
shipping station, but a man does who produces milk, peaches, potatoes
or hay.

In these days there is not much danger that the character of the
roadway will be overlooked by the intending purchaser of the farm,
although sufficient importance may not be given to the advantage of
really good roads, both as to grade and surface. Perhaps the one most
important question to consider in connection with the transportation
facilities is whether products may be shipped without change from the
shipping station to the market it is desired to reach.

Although at first glance we may not like the thought, it must be
conceded that neighbors are not only important morally and socially,
but they also may have economic advantages and disadvantages. While it
may sometimes happen that it will be wise to raise in a given
neighborhood some product that no one else has undertaken to supply,
yet as a rule, if a given neighborhood is raising Jersey, or Guernsey
or Holstein cattle or Chester White, Berkshire or Poland China hogs,
or Southdown or Shropshire or Cotswold sheep, it will be wise to raise
the breed commonly raised instead of the least commonly raised breed,
as it is sometimes supposed. The more potato growers or cabbage
growers or celery raisers or orchardists in a locality the better for
all concerned, for a number of reasons, among which may be mentioned
(1) the more and the better the products raised the more buyers will
seek the region and hence the higher will be the price obtained for
the product; (2) the more of a given product there is to ship the
better the shipping facilities for that product are likely to be; (3)
all the necessary supplies for the type of farming can be more readily
and cheaply obtained; (4) there will be a better knowledge of the
business when more men have had experience in raising the particular
crop.

These principles apply in all classes of business; thus we find woolen
factories in Philadelphia, silk factories at Paterson, N. J., cotton
factories at Lowell, Mass., plow factories at Moline, Ill., and steel
mills at Pittsburg. Many of these centers possessed originally some
natural advantages which caused the location of the first factory, but
others have been drawn there on account of the principles enunciated.
The farmers of a given region have a community of interest as well as
railroads. The young farmer should recognize this fact and if
necessary should exert himself to develop such interest in his
community, both for his own benefit and that of his neighbors.

There are two classes of farms for which the purchaser is in danger of
paying too much, one on which there are extensive improvements and one
on which there are none at all. A farm with just barely enough
improvements for the conduct of the type of farming it is proposed to
develop can usually be purchased most advantageously. The purchaser
should understand clearly that the previous cost of the improvements
has no necessary relation to their present value, any more than the
value of a second-hand suit of clothes is dependent upon its original
cost. All depends on how badly they are worn and how well they are
adapted to present conditions. The value of farm improvements is not
unlike those in other business enterprises in this respect. Their
value depends upon present and prospective earning capacity and not on
former cost.

No rule can be laid down as to the relation which should exist between
the value of land itself and the value of the improvements. In
practice it varies greatly. In the United States the farm improvements
constitute on an average 21% of the total value of land, being as high
as 45% in Massachusetts and as low as 15% in Texas. The young farmer
may well consider, therefore, whether he can earn interest on his
investment when the improvements cost more than 25% of the total value
of the real estate. Certainly when it becomes one-half it is
excessive. The man who runs a farm as an avocation usually errs in
putting too much money into permanent improvements for the farm to be
a paying investment.

If it is admitted that the farm unit is limited because of the
physical difficulties of managing large areas, then it must at once be
seen how important the arrangement of the farmsteading must be to the
successful conduct of the farm. In the older farming communities where
the present farm holdings are the result of several purchases or sales
the shape of the farm, the arrangement of the fields and the place of
the farm buildings become an extremely important matter. Sometimes
satisfactory rearrangements are easily made, at other times they are
quite impossible. No attempt will be made to discuss this subject in
detail here, but the young farmer should bring to this question all
the experience and study possible.

When the young farmer goes to inspect a farm it is to be assumed that
he will be conducted over the farm by the owner or his authorized
agent. It is proper to give respectful attention to everything that is
told him, provided he follows carefully the California adage to
"believe nothing you hear and only one-half what you see."

If a farm consists of 200 or 300 acres of land, it is possible for the
agent to convey the purchaser over the farm in such a way as to
prevent the least desirable portions being seen. If the farm has
attracted the seeker of land, he should not purchase until he has made
another visit, preferably some days or weeks after the first one. He
may then very properly visit the farm alone, passing over quite a
different course from that pursued hitherto. Sketches and notes will
be found very helpful, and if the use of the soil auger is understood
it may be well employed to study the character of both soil and
subsoil. During the interval between visits some casual inquiries may
be made among those who know the history of the farm in question,
because the past history of the farm obtained from unprejudiced
witnesses is of prime importance in arriving at a conclusion
concerning its value.

A farm is much more attractive when a crop is growing upon it than
when it is without active vegetation. Poor land looks relatively
better than good land during or just after a rain. Many matters
concerning the selection of a farm can only be learned by some years
of practical experience. The young farmer will do well, therefore, to
secure the help of some more experienced person. If he has among his
acquaintances a successful farmer of mature years he will be fortunate
if he can secure his advice.

                             CHAPTER VIII

                           THE FARM SCHEME

Farming is no pink tea. It is a serious business. After the young
farmer has selected the farm he must develop his farm scheme. He must
contemplate well and seriously the philosophy which underlies his
plans. Unless he sees clearly what he is striving to attain and unless
he understands the effect of his methods, he must fail in great
measure to obtain his goal.

Satisfactory results in farming cannot be obtained as a general
practice if the man is only interested in the results of a single
year. For this reason the itinerant tenant system will not be
satisfactory unless the landlord has worked out a satisfactory scheme
which he requires his tenant to follow.

It is not enough that a man shall grow a single large crop, but it is
necessary that he should continue to grow a satisfactory crop at least
at regular intervals. For example, a piece of land may be adapted to
cabbage, celery, potatoes or hay. Assume for the moment it is adapted
to cabbage and that by one or more seasons of preparation an enormous
crop of cabbages may be secured. This fact is of little value unless
sufficient quantity is raised and the process can be repeated
annually. Cabbages cannot be grown again on this particular piece of
land for from four to six years on account of club root. If the farmer
does not have other areas which he can bring into cabbages year after
year, for from three to five years, then he becomes a failure as a
cabbage raiser. Even a perennial, like alfalfa or asparagus, should
form a part of the general scheme of crop production if the most
satisfactory results are to be obtained.

There are two general questions at the basis of all farm schemes: (1)
How to obtain a fairly uniform succession of cash products year after
year, and (2) how to keep up or improve the fertility of the soil
economically while doing so. In other words, how to keep the
investment from decreasing while it is earning a satisfactory and
fairly uniform income.

It is necessary, therefore, to consider what products are to be sold
and what are simply subsidiary to the cash products. The cash products
may, of course, be soil products or animal products, but more likely
they will be both. When animals form a large part of the enterprise
the cropping system must be carefully adjusted to meet the needs of
these animals. Many apparently trivial details must be considered, as
for example, whether the cropping system furnishes too little or too
much bedding for the live stock.

In considering profits the enterprise as a whole must be kept in view.
For example, if a man is producing milk, it may be cheaper, so far as
the production of milk is concerned, to allow the liquid excrement to
run to waste rather than to arrange for sufficient bedding. If,
however, by using an abundance of bedding and saving all the
high-priced nitrogen and the larger part of the potash in the manure,
he is able to raise twelve tons of silage in place of eight tons, or
three tons of hay in place of two tons, his enterprise as a whole will
be more profitable when he uses the extra amount of bedding, although
so far as the production of a quart of milk is concerned the cost is
increased. It may be that by feeding corn to cattle or sheep one will
obtain only 50 cents a bushel for his maize, while his neighbor is
selling it to the elevator at 60 cents. If, however, the man who feeds
his maize year after year thereby raises 60 bushels instead of 40
bushels, his enterprise, as a whole, may be more profitable than that
of his neighbor.

As a matter of fact, the Pennsylvania experiment station has
substantially these two conditions in certain of its fertilizer plats.
When for 25 years the conditions have been similar to those where
crops are sold from the farm, the yields have been: Maize, 42 bushels;
oats, 32 bushels; wheat, 14 bushels; and hay, 2,783 pounds per acre.
But when conditions exist which represent the feeding of corn, oats
and hay and the return of manure to the soil, the yields have been:
Maize, 58 bushels; oats, 41 bushels; wheat, 23 bushels; and hay 4,190
pounds per acre. In the first instance the value of the products has
been $15.75 an acre, while in the other case it has been $22.90 an
acre.

Having worked out a cropping system that gives the proper yearly
production of several crops desired, the next question to decide is
how this cropping system and the disposition of the crops is going to
affect the fertility of the soil. From a financial or economic point
of view the most important soil element is nitrogen. First, because it
costs from 18 to 20 cents a pound, while phosphoric acid can be
purchased at five cents, potash at four cents; and, second, because of
the readiness with which nitrogen may disappear from the soil under
improper management, either through nitrification and leaching or by
denitrification and passing back into the air.

Assuming a given type of management, the question is, How much of the
required nitrogen will be obtained from the legumes in the cropping
system, how much from the manure, and how much must be purchased in
commercial fertilizers? No satisfactory cropping system can be devised
at the present prices of farm products and cost of fertilizers for the
production of the ordinary cereals and hay that does not include the
production of some legume. Assuming a legume in the cropping scheme,
the fertility of the soil may be maintained by yard manure alone or by
commercial fertilizers alone. Illustrations of both methods are to be
found in actual practice. Generally speaking, however, the use of yard
manure supplemented with commercial fertilizers will be found more
scientific and in the end the most economical.

A factor entering into this problem will be the amount of purchased
feed. If considerable amounts of purchased feeds are used and the
resulting manure carefully preserved and judiciously applied, the
commercial fertilizers required will be reduced to the minimum.

A concrete illustration may bring out the philosophy underlying farm
schemes better than abstract problems.

The following outline shows a five-course rotation with the method of
fertilization which the results of the Pennsylvania Station indicated
would be advisable, at least on limestone soils in eastern United
States.

    1. Maize                yard manure, 8 tons per acre.
    2. Oats                 nothing.
    3. Wheat                acid phosphate, 350 lbs.
                            muriate of potash, 100 lbs.
    4. Clover and timothy   nothing.
    5. Timothy              nitrate of soda, 150 lbs.
                            acid phosphate, 150 lbs.
                            muriate of potash, 50 lbs.

This rotation is suggested for the purpose of maintaining a farm that
is already in a fairly fertile condition and one on which there is no
considerable amount of purchased feed. Where concentrates are
purchased liberally, yard manure should be available to use on the
timothy and meadow in place of the commercial fertilizers.

Where there is plenty of manure and it is desired to increase the
amount of maize and hay and reduce the amount of oats and wheat, the
following rotation and method of fertilization would be indicated:

    1.  Maize                acid phosphate, 200 lbs.
    2.  Maize                yard manure, 8 tons.
    3.  Oats                 nothing.
    4.  Wheat                acid phosphate, 350 lbs.
                             muriate of potash, 100 lbs.
    5.  Clover and timothy   nothing.
    6.  Timothy              nitrate of soda, 150 lbs.
                             acid phosphate, 150 lbs.
                             muriate of potash, 50 lbs.
    7.  Timothy              yard manure, 8 tons.

Where there is plenty of yard manure, it would be also applied to
maize under No. 1, or the yard manure could be applied to maize under
No. 1, and commercial fertilizer applied to timothy under No. 6 could
be repeated under No. 7. If the land is more or less depleted, an
application of 200 pounds of acid phosphate to the oats would be
advisable. However, the purpose is not to prescribe exact methods, but
to point out underlying principles and their possible application.

As further illustration, it seems probable that the practice of a
market gardener in using excessive amounts of stable manure might, in
some instances at least, be modified to good advantage by reducing the
amount of manure and increasing the amount of commercial fertilizer
used. Unfortunately there is no experimental evidence bearing upon
this question.

Potash required to maintain fertility is largely to be found in the
coarse fodder, such as hay, maize stover and silage, and in the straw
used for bedding; hence where these substances are used in abundance
and returned to the soil the amount of potash required to be supplied
in fertilizers is reduced to a minimum. Where, however, the amount of
live stock is limited and the products sold contain large quantities
of potash, such as hay and straw, the supply furnished in fertilizers
must be liberal.

Phosphoric acid is always being slowly depleted from the soil either
from the sale of farm crops or animal products. There is no way of
returning this loss completely, except from the addition of a
commercial fertilizer.

The above fertilizer suggestions are based on the experiments covering
a period of more than 25 years on a limestone soil. Soils may modify
materially the amount and application of the fertilizers, but not the
principles enunciated. For example, a soil on which common red clover
grows luxuriantly and has a prominent place in the farm scheme will
require less nitrogen in commercial fertilizers in order to maintain
the fertility than where legumes are raised with difficulty or do not
form a part of the farm scheme.

One of the most important points to be emphasized is the fact that
haphazard fertilization is not effective in maintaining soil
fertility. If one starts out to establish a five-course rotation and
build up his soil through a rational system of fertilization, he will
obviously not obtain the full benefit of the rotation until he begins
to get crops from the second round, which will be the sixth year from
the beginning. It may happen, and unfortunately it has perhaps usually
happened in the past, that during the first rotation the increase in
crops has not paid for the cost of the fertilizers applied. In many
instances a rational system of fertilization has not been introduced
because the owner of the land could not afford to wait six years for
his return. Profit in farming, therefore, does not consist in raising
one big crop or even in obtaining a large balance on the right side of
the ledger in a single year. It is both interesting and valuable to
know that five tons of timothy hay, 45 bushels of wheat, 100 bushels
of maize and 40 tons of cabbage may be raised on an acre, but the real
profit in farming only comes through a lifetime of effort. To the man
of capacity who prepares for his work the results will surely come,
but they will not come all at once and, as in every other business, he
must pay the price in hard work and close application to details.

In this connection it may be emphasized that one of the difficulties
in successful farming is to find one man both interested and capable
along the various lines essential to a successful farm enterprise. The
danger is that a man will ride his hobby to the detriment of the other
activities of the farm. A farmer friend of the writer, who keeps a
horse and buggy, cares so little for a horse that for several years he
has walked two miles each morning and each evening rather than to take
the trouble to hitch up his horse. If one visits a high-grade breeder
of dairy cattle, he is very apt to find his pigs of ordinary
character. On the other hand, a specialist in hogs is likely to keep
scrub cows. A man may be an excellent wheat raiser and a poor potato
grower, and the reverse. The breeder of live stock is likely to be
lacking in his methods of producing farm crops, while the up-to-date,
so-called general farmer is not likely to be a special lover of live
stock. In like manner, the man may be a successful farmer, dairyman or
horticulturist from the producing side, but be a poor salesman. In
fact, those qualities of mind and heart which make for the best
success from the standpoint of production, whether soil products or
animal products, is not that which makes the best trader.

It is not expected that the young farmer will be materially different
from his hundreds of thousands of predecessors, but the better a man
is trained and the more fully he studies his own adaptabilities and
deficiencies, the more likely he is to succeed in the open country.
For this reason, the young man should be careful to get as broad a
training as possible. It is, therefore, often more important for him
to study those things which he dislikes than to study the things for
which he has a natural taste.

             There was a man in our town
               And he was wondrous wise.
             He knew that if he wanted crops
               He'd have to fertilize.

             "Its nitrogen that makes things green,"
               Said this man of active brain;
             "And potash makes the good strong straw,
               And phosphate plumps the grain.
             But it's clearly wrong to waste plant food
               On a wet and soggy field;
             I'll surely have to put in drains
               If I'd increase the yield.

             "And after I have drained the land
               I must plow it deep all over;
             And even then I'll not succeed
               Unless it will grow clover.
             Now, acid soils will not produce
               A clover sod that's prime;
             So if I have a sour soil,
               I'll have to put on lime.

             "And after doing all these things,
               To make success more sure,
             I'll try my very best to keep
               From wasting the manure.
             So I'll drain, and lime, and cultivate,
               With all that that implies;
             And when I've done that thoroughly
               I'll manure and fertilize."
                                               _Vivian_

                              CHAPTER IX

                        THE ROTATION OF CROPS

The two essential reasons for a rotation of crops are: (1) The
possibility of obtaining for the soil a supply of nitrogen from the
air by introducing a legume at regular intervals, and (2) the
prevention of injury to the crops from fungous diseases, insect
enemies, weeds or other causes. Other reasons are often advanced, some
of which are entirely erroneous, while others are of quite secondary
importance.

The rotation should be carefully studied with reference to the farm
scheme as previously outlined. Reasons for modifying the rotations are:
(1) To change the kind or proportion of crops grown, (2) to change the
amount of labor required, or (3) to increase the crop-producing power
of the soil.

During 25 years the four crops of maize, oats, wheat, timothy and
clover hay have been taken in rotation from the four tiers of plats at
the Pennsylvania State College, so that the influence of the soil has
been entirely eliminated. At the December farm prices for the decade
ending December 1, 1906, the value of these four crops per acre have
been: Maize, $29.67; oats, $14.49; wheat, $18.49; and hay, $18.05. It
will be noted that during 25 years the average income from an acre of
maize has been almost exactly twice that from an acre of oats. The
region where these results were obtained is relatively unfavorable to a
large yield of maize. It is obvious, therefore, that a modification in
the rotation may modify the average income from the farm materially,
provided such modification does not reduce the fertility of the soil.
Thus, while the average income per acre during 25 years for the
four-course rotation above mentioned was $20.17, if the rotation were
increased to a five-course rotation by the addition of another year of
maize, the average income would be $22.45 an acre.

It may be desirable to modify the rotation in order to increase or
decrease a certain crop usually fed upon the farm. Thus, with a
four-course rotation of maize, oats, wheat, clover and timothy,
one-fourth the area would produce hay; while with a six-course
rotation, composed of maize, oats, wheat, each one year, and hay three
years, one-half the area would produce hay. If it is desired to still
further reduce the area in oats and wheat, a seven-course rotation
could be arranged with maize, two years in succession. This is the
rotation that would be desirable for a dairy farm where it is planned
to keep as many cows as practicable and to buy the concentrates
largely. Either the wheat or the oats could be taken out of this
rotation if either the one or the other were thought undesirable and a
still greater amount of roughage desired.

On the other hand, there are places where the minimum amount of
roughage is wanted. There are certain sections of the central West
where it is possible to sow oats on corn stubble without plowing and
where occasionally a rotation is practiced of maize, oats and mammoth
clover. The clover is plowed for maize, the oats are disked in upon
the corn stubble and the next year the clover is pastured until about
June 1, when it is allowed to go to seed. In this rotation the only
roughage obtained is the corn stover and the oat straw.

Another result reached by this rotation is that only one-third the
land is plowed annually. In the four-course rotation mentioned above
three-fourths of the land must be plowed, while in the six-course
rotation one-half is plowed each year. In other ways the character of
the rotation modifies the labor. For example, the labor and cost of
harvesting an acre of hay is much less than that of producing,
harvesting and threshing an acre of wheat.

Rotations may often be planned with reference to the main or cash
crop. Thus in the Aroostook (Maine) potato district the rotation is
potatoes, oats and clover. The chief purpose of the oats and clover is
to keep down the blight in potatoes and add through the clover
nitrogen and organic matter to the soil.

A system of cropping that is best when the owner operates the farm may
not be desirable when the farmer is a tenant. When a farm is rented,
the lease should provide that clover or other legumes occur with
sufficient frequency to keep up the supply of nitrogen without the
purchase of a considerable quantity in chemical fertilizers. The lease
should be so drawn as to make it necessary for the tenant to keep live
stock in order to realize the largest profit. The landlord should
provide an equitable proportion of the mineral fertilizers when such
are required.

The provisions of the lease and the character of the rotation will
necessarily vary with circumstances, but the following system of
tenant farming which has been employed for many years in Maryland will
illustrate the principles just stated:

The lease provides for a five-course rotation consisting of maize,
wheat, clover, wheat, clover. The landlord and the tenant share the
maize and wheat equally, but the clover for hay or pasture goes
entirely to the tenant, unless hay is sold, when it is divided
equally. They each provide one-half the commercial fertilizer and
one-half the seed, except clover seed, which the tenant is required to
furnish.

This lease provides for two clover crops out of every five crops
raised, thus supplying nitrogen abundantly, and the terms of the lease
are such that it is necessary for the tenant to keep live stock to
consume these clover crops in order to secure the most profitable
returns. The feeding of the clover makes it necessary to feed some or
all the maize and may lead to buying additional concentrates.

Stable manure is thereby supplied for the field which is to raise
maize, while mineral fertilizers may be applied to the fields sown to
wheat. On the limestone soils of the eastern states 50 pounds each of
phosphoric acid and potash per acre applied to the wheat, and 10 loads
of stable manure per acre to the maize will probably be found
sufficient to maintain the crop producing power of the soil.

In laying out a farm for a rotation it is desirable to plan the number
of fields or tracts that will go in a rotation and try to get these as
nearly equal size as possible. Having decided upon the number of years
the rotation is to run and having adjusted the fields or tracts
accordingly, it is quite possible to modify the proportion of crops by
adding one crop and dropping another at the same time. Thus, if there
are six 20-acre fields, any one of the following rotations might be
used and the change from one to another easily made:

    1. Maize        Maize       Maize        Maize        Maize
    2. Oats         Maize       Maize        Maize        Barley
    3. Wheat        Oats        Oats         Wheat        Alfalfa
    4. Clover and   Wheat       Clover and   Clover and   Alfalfa
         timothy                  timothy      timothy
    5. Timothy      Clover and  Timothy      Timothy      Alfalfa
                      timothy
    6. Timothy      Timothy     Timothy      Timothy      Alfalfa

During the first year the 20-acre field could be divided into four
tracts of five acres each, containing potatoes, cabbage, tomatoes and
sweet corn, and then followed for four or five years by any succession
of crops above outlined. The point is that a definite adjustment of
the farm to some general method of rotation and a definite system of
fertilization and soil renovation do not prevent a considerable
latitude in the crops raised. It will be obvious that the longer the
rotation the more flexible it becomes in this particular, which is a
point to be considered in laying out the farm and in adjusting fields
and fences.

In some cases it may be desirable on account of the arrangement of the
farm or the character of the crops to be raised to have two distinct
rotations of crops. For example, if the farm lends itself to be
divided into eight tracts, a five-course rotation of maize, oats,
wheat, each one year, and clover and timothy two years, and a
three-course rotation of potatoes, oats or wheat and clover may be
arranged.

                              CHAPTER X

                            THE EQUIPMENT

The workman is known by his tools. The problem of obtaining the most
efficient machinery for the conduct of the farm without having an
excessive amount is not easy of solution.

It is probable that the cost of maintaining machinery and tools is not
less than 15%, 10% for upkeep and 5% for interest, even under the most
careful management. Doubtless in practice it is as much as 25%. If
this is conceded there must be a limit to the amount which may be
economically invested in equipment. This is a place where the lead
pencil may be used profitably. For example, if $125 is invested in a
self-binder, the annual cost of the machine at 15% will be $18.75. If
one has but 15 acres of grain to harvest, it may be better to hire a
self-binder at $1 an acre. On the other hand, it may be necessary to
own a self-binder in order to get the grain harvested at the proper
time.

Among the machines requiring a considerable investment for the number
of days used may be mentioned hay loaders, hay tedders, corn-binding
harvesters and lime spreaders. There is a certain class of labor-saving
devices, however, for which there is more or less constant need, as,
for example, means of pumping water, methods of handling manure, both
from the stable to the manure shed, and from the manure shed to the
field. This leads to the remark that there is at present great need of
modifying our traditional ideas concerning farm barns. Why do persons
usually sleep on the second floor, while horses and cattle are placed
in the basement? Three things have brought about the need of a radical
revision of our practices concerning the planning of barns: (1) Our
present knowledge of the difference in the function of food in keeping
the animal warm, and that of producing work, flesh or milk; (2) the
discovery of the bacillus of tuberculosis; and (3) the invention of the
hay carrier. It is not the purpose here to discuss barn buildings, but
merely to call attention to the fact that the traditional barn has long
since outlived its usefulness, and that the young farmer should plan
his farm buildings to serve the purposes required in the light of
modern knowledge.

Various attempts have been made to manufacture combined machines; that
is, a machine which, by an interchange of parts or other modification,
may be used for two or more purposes, as, for example, harvesting
small grain and cutting grass. Such attempts have usually been
unsuccessful. On the other hand, the young farmer should consider the
range of usefulness of any given type of machine or tool; thus, a disk
harrow is more efficient for some purposes than a spring-tooth harrow.
For other purposes the spike-tooth harrow is better than the spring
tooth. The spring-tooth harrow, however, will do fairly well wherever
the disk harrow or the spike-tooth harrow is needed. When, therefore,
only one of these tools can be afforded, the spring tooth may be a
better tool to buy than either the disk or the spike-tooth, although
it is not for certain purposes as efficient as either of the others.

The kind of machine should obviously be adjusted to the conditions,
as, for example, the size of the farm, and the character of the
farming. Riding plows may be desirable on level land, but where it is
necessary to plow up and down hill, walking plows should be used. The
extra weight of the wheel plow is not a serious matter on level land,
because the sliding friction has been transferred to rolling friction,
but no mechanical device has been or can be invented which will
decrease the power necessary to raise a given weight a given height.
The various machines requiring horse power should be adjusted, as far
as possible, to require the same number of horses. If the main unit is
three horses, then, as far as possible, all machines should require
three horses, such as plows, harrows, manure spreaders, harvesters,
etc. If the activities of the farm are sufficient to require six
horses then some of the tools may require three horses each, while
others require a pair.

[Illustration: Mr. R. H. Garrahan, Kingston, Pa., is one of the most
successful growers of celery in the United States. After graduating from
the Wyoming Seminary he spent one year studying horticulture at the
Pennsylvania State College. For several years he was assistant in
horticulture at the University of Tennessee. He now has at Kingston 60
acres under intensive cultivation. His principal crops are celery,
asparagus, cabbage, tomatoes and onions.]

[Illustration: H. H. Richardson, Brooklyn Heights, Ohio, agricultural
graduate, Ohio State University, 1892. Fourteen years ago inherited 35
acres of land and an indebtedness of $1,750. He has raised a family of
four children, has what is seen in the picture plus the land and $6,000
invested elsewhere. Mr. Richardson has held some local public office
continuously during the past ten years, being at present member of school
and water boards, member of advisory board of bank, secretary of
Cleveland Fruit and Vegetable Growers' Association and Ohio
vice-president of the National Vegetable Growers' Association.]

A farm with six work horses is rather a desirable one from several
aspects. Among other things, it enables the farm owner to employ two
men who can perform most of the team work with two three-horse teams,
while at other times three pairs of horses may be arranged when the
owner needs to use a team. This leaves the farmer time to attend to
many activities not requiring horses, and time to plan the work and to
look with more care after the purchases and sales. The size of such a
farm will depend entirely on the nature of the activities. If it is a
so-called general farm with a minimum of live stock, it would,
perhaps, consist of from 150 to 180 acres of tillable land with some
additional pasture and woodland. Ideally, every farm should have
sufficient activity to make it something of a center. It should be an
organism. It is difficult to organize one man.

It will be useful, when we come to discuss how profits may be
estimated, to divide the capital into three general groups: (1) The
plant, which in addition to the real estate, will include the machines
and tools, horses used for labor, and other animals used for breeding
purposes or for the production of animal products, such as butter,
wool or eggs; (2) materials, which will include animals which are to
be fattened for sale, and all seeds, fertilizers and foods intended to
be turned into products to be sold; (3) supplies, which may include
foods for teams, and money with which to pay labor, be this labor that
of the farmer or his employees.

The purpose of this classification is to bring sharply into view the
fact that the nature of different kinds of equipment varies. All the
things named under the plant are in the nature of an annual charge
against income. The charge under materials may or may not be an annual
charge. If a man invests $2,000 in 50 head of cattle, which he intends
to feed and sell for $3,250 at the end of one hundred days, he does
not have to calculate interest on $2,000 for a year, but only for 100
days. Cattle paper is held in large quantities by banks in the cattle
feeding districts of the United States. The farmer would, in fact, be
unwise to keep $2,000 in the bank nine months in the year in order to
use it three months. Like any other business man, if he has the money,
he invests it and borrows the money to buy his cattle. The same thing
applies to food and fertilizers. If the food is fed to cattle, some of
the money invested in the food must pay interest during the fattening
period. Food fed to dairy cattle and chickens may be paid for out of
each day's income. In practice, the amount of money invested in food
for dairy cattle and chickens is dependent only upon the most
economical unit of purchase. One may apply fertilizers to buckwheat,
give a three months' note for the fertilizer, and pay the note out of
the proceeds of the crop. If the fertilizer is applied to one-year-old
apple trees, this investment may be required to pay interest for
fifteen years.

The same principle applies to supplies. If one starts into raising
horses for sale, he needs to have some money or other income on which
his laborers and his own family can live, say for five years, this
being the age at which a horse is supposed to become salable. More
people would raise apples and horses if they could afford to wait for
the return on the investment.

While this is a serious handicap, it is an advantage to the man who
arranges his farming methods so that he can secure an income from some
other source in the interim. The young farmer will do wisely to so
arrange his farm methods that a portion, perhaps the major portion of
his farm, will give him quick returns while making some long-time
investments, which later in life will give him a greater return
because so few people are sufficiently forehanded to make them.

                              CHAPTER XI

                       HOW TO ESTIMATE PROFITS

No man who engages in manufacturing or merchandising knows how much he
is going to make annually during life. Much less does he know how much
he will be worth when he dies. Neither does the man who works for a
salary or practices some profession for fees know what his annual
income will be even during the following decade. Neither one nor the
other knows whether he will die a millionaire or a pauper. It is a
problem too complex for any human mind to analyze. It is less certain
than what the weather will be on this day next year, because it is the
resultant of more variable factors.

In some respects there is more hazard in farming than in manufacturing
or in merchandising, while in other respects there is much less. The
profit which may be obtained from farming is neither easier nor more
difficult to estimate than is that of other commercial enterprises.
However, there is no business in which more foolish estimates are made
as to the probable profits, except, perhaps, in mining.

The purpose of this chapter is not to give advice as to possible or
probable profits, but rather to point out the general character of the
data required for any individual problem, where the data may be
obtained and how it may be applied.

There are two forms or methods of stating the financial gain that has
been obtained from farming or other business ventures during a year or
other specific period. The first may be called the interest on the
investment method, and the second the labor income method.

With the interest on the investment method, all expenses may be
subtracted from all the sales. From the cash balance thus obtained the
increase or decrease in inventory may be added or subtracted. This
balance may then be divided by the capital invested, to determine the
rate of interest received.

The rate of interest method is the usual method in the commercial
world. The prosperity of the railroad or industrial concern is judged
by the rate of interest it pays its stockholders on the par value of
the stock. The stock itself takes on the capitalization in accordance
with the present and prospective dividends. The fact that this method
is generally used in the commercial world is evidence that it is well
suited to its needs.

The young farmer who wishes to know whether the operation of a given
tract of land in a certain manner offers him a worthy opportunity will
not find the interest on the investment method the best suited for his
purpose. This is especially true when applied to a single product. For
example, it may be shown that 50 hens will, when properly managed, in
connection with other farm enterprises, return a remarkable interest
on the capital employed. It does not follow, however, that a man can
make a living with fifty hens or even 500 hens. If a man has an
investment of $5,000, on which he obtains 10 per cent, his income
would be $500. If, on the other hand, he has an investment of $25,000
and obtains a return of only 6%, his income is $1,500, or three times
the former amount. In neither case, however, does this form of
statement tell a man how much of his income is due to his brain and
brawn and how much to the capital invested.

What the young farmer wishes to know is how much will he receive for
his own time, energy and skill, after deducting all expenses and a
reasonable interest charge on his investment--such a rate of interest
as he could get by placing his money in good securities or what he
would be required to pay for his capital if he borrowed it. This is
best obtained by the labor income method. With this method all
expenses are subtracted from all sales and to the cash balance thus
obtained is added or subtracted the increase or decrease in the
inventory. This balance may be called the farm income. Thus far the
procedure is just the same as the interest on the investment method.
From the farm income is now subtracted a reasonable interest on the
investment, the balance remaining is called the labor income. This is
the return which the farmer has obtained by and for his own efforts.
If this balance is zero, then he should change his methods or get into
some other business.

This statement of his income, whatever it may be, enables him to
compare his prosperity with that of the man who is employed upon a
salary. Here, again, however, it is difficult to make comparisons
because of the differences in expenses of living. The chief difference,
however, in the expense of the wage earner in the city and the farmer
is in the matter of house rent. For example, if the wage earner pays
$300 a year house rent that must be deducted from his income in
comparing it with the labor income of the farmer. It is often stated
that the farmer also has his living from the farm. This was much more
true formerly than it is at present. Under present methods of
distributing food products and with modern types of farming, the amount
of food supplied the table from the farm is comparatively small. The
rancher in Montana eats foods canned in Maine or Delaware, while the
New Hampshire farmer buys his vegetables from Boston commission
merchants. The Minnesota farmer cannot supply his breakfast table with
oranges, grapefruit or oatmeal. Many of them buy, if not their bread,
at least their flour, and also their butter. The fact that the city man
indulges in high living is no argument in favor of the country man
expecting less wages. Some of those things which are necessary to make
the country an ideal place to live are expensive. Some of them are more
expensive to obtain in the country than in the city, as, for example,
educational facilities. In justifying his purchase of an automobile, a
young farmer recently stated that his wife had certain cares,
responsibilities and even privations which her city friends did not
have. He thought that the automobile would help to offset them.

To my mind there is no more ideal place to live and rear a family than
in the open country when the conditions are what they should be and
may be. I believe, however, it is well to insist that it costs
something to live in the country as well as in the city if one lives