LIVE STOCK

A PRODUCER OF WEALTH

BERKSHIRE HOGS

Compiled by
CLARENDON DAVIS, PRESIDENT
HUNTSVILLE BANK © TRUST CO.
Huntsville, Ala.

LIVE STOCK
A PRODUCER OF WEALTH

HUNTSVILLE BANK & TRUST CO.

Compiled by
Clarendon Davis, President
Huntsville Bank & Trust Co.
Huntsville, Ala.

Copyrighted, 1913, by Clarendon Davis

Nashville, Tenn. ye
McQuippy PRINTING Co.
1918

THE TENNESSEE VALLEY

7>11EN God created the Tennessee Valley, he smiled
upon it. He made a beautiful undulating prairie and
dropped cloud-tapping mountains here and there,
forming fertile valleys, traced with sparkling streams

of pure water; and over all he threw a mantle of
stately forests and nutritious grasses.

Nature made this country a “ farmer’s paradise.” Had man done
his part, what a beautiful panorama would now be presented to the
eye of man! A country clothed in its original fertility; its valleys
flecked here and there with pretty homes, amidst fields of cotton
and cereals; its pastures extending over the rolling lands and far up
the mountain sides; the cattle, with their well-filled paunches,
quietly resting under the shade of the trees, would be a picture
of peace and plenty nestling over all like a benediction.

What man has destroyed must be rebuilt, and to those farmers
and business men who will join us in our effort to restore this coun-
try to its original beauty and worth this little book is respectfully
dedicated.

HUNTSVILLE BANK AND TRUST COMPANY.

©ClA851873

THE BANKER AND THE FARMER

= T has only been in yery recent years that a farmer in the
South could borrow from a bank. His merchant was his
banker, or else he went to a money lender for his loans.

In fact, under the old banking régime the average borrower, be
he farmer or merchant, went to the banks to borrow under urgent
necessity, for he dreaded the visit to that little partitioned-off cor-

Huntsville Bank and Trust Company

ner which held the cashier's desk and an extra chair. It was like
walking into the ammoniated chamber of an ice factory to get re-
lief from the cold world. Your blood was chilled to the freezing
point by the thought of the great and generous favor you were:
about to ask for. You went there asking for a favor; and as you
dangled your hat in your hand or wiped cold beads of perspiration

Lives STOCI

from your brow, you gladly welcomed a “ Yes” or “ No” for the
relief it brought from that awful suspense. You felt as grateful
for the “ No” as you expected to feel for the “ Yes.” You made
a break for the door like a loose mule out of the barn on a frosty
morning, and put distance between you and that financial iceberg.
The farther you retreated, the warmer the air seemed to feel; and
as you turned to get one last look at that mystery of mysteries, you
wondered at your courage that-led you to face it.

Now be honest. Did you ever have that experience? Or was it
you never got up the necessary courage?

The Huntsville Bank and Trust Company realizes that its inter-
ests and the interests of the farmer are identical. They cannot be
separated, and the bank feels that any help it can extend to the
farmer will more than be repaid in an increase of business, besides
the satisfaction in knowing that it is an institution that is a benefit
to the community in which it is established. Banks are estab-
lished for the benefit and the accommodation of those who wish to
take advantage of the opportunities their facilities offer, and not for
the profits or salaries of those who run them. ‘The first duty of a
bank is to safeguard the interest of its customers, regardless of the
profits derived therefrom. We want the farmers’ banking busi-
ness, and promise them fair and courteous treatment and all accom-
modations consistent with prudent banking. We extend to you an
invitation to become a customer. It matters not how small, your
account will be welcome.

We want you to feel that you are always welcome to bring your
financial troubles to us, and that we will always try to help you.
Make this bank your headquarters and meeting place while in town.
Write your letters or transact any private business. We will as-
sist you in figuring out your sales tickets for the sale of your farm
products or interest on your notes; in fact, we want you to fully
realize that we run this bank for your accommodation and infor-
mation. It matters not whether you are making a deposit, asking
for a loan, having us figure up a cotton ticket, or want a bulletin
on some special farm product or to place your valuable papers in
our vault for safe-keeping, we will try to make you feel that you
have done us a favor.

We have spent years in studying and practicing farm methods

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Liwit StO Cis

best adapted to our soil and climate. We have spent years experi-
menting, and have kept an accurate account on the money returns.
We are familiar with the needs and conditions of the farmer. We
have not only made a study of successful farming in this county,
but in other counties of this State and some counties in other States
having the same soil and climatic conditions.

We have gathered a fund of information that is yours for the
asking. If we cannot help you, we wiil bring some one into the
county who can, as we have been assured of the hearty codperation
of the United States and State Departments of Agriculture, State
Experiment Station, and the Southern and Nashville, Chattanooga
and St. Louis Railways, with their armies of experts.

CLARENDON DAVIS:

THE BUSINESS FARMER

S the farmer prospers, so will every other line of business
5 ( prosper. He is a wealth producer, and upon his shoulders
rests the financial prosperity of the State. Ii he fails, the
State fails. Then it becomes the duty of every citizen, every com-
mercial enterprise, to encourage and assist him in his efforts for
better credits, better farms, better stock, better buildings, roads,
schoolhouses, and churches, that he and his family may enjoy bet-
ter social conditions and enjoy the pleasures and some of the lux-
uries of this life.

Good roads and the telephone and the rural mail have put the
farmer in touch with the outside world, and those who are ambi-
tious to rise above the common level have become thinkers and
students and are rapidly making themselves recognized as busi-
ness men.

The gap separating the wide-awake business farmer from the
slipshod, fertility-destroying individual who plants in the moon
and depends upon nature for the profit is broadening every day.
The business farmer is advancing with the rest of the world, while
his unfortunate neighbor who farms as did his ancestors is drifting
down the stream of adversity.

The common conception of the business side of the farmer is

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Livi STOCK

1. Young Mules. 2. A Farm Home

to sow, reap, haul the products to town, sell them for what they
bring, pay your debts, and go back home to start all over again.

The farmer of to-day must be a business man, contrary to the
common conception of what it takes to be a farmer.

Page 6

LUWis, SO CIx

The success of a business is measured by results. The success
of a farmer is not measured by his efforts, but by the results of his
efforts. Results are what count. The crop result of an acre de-
termines the value of the soil. If by business methods in cultiva-
tion and business methods in placing the products on the market
we are enabled to double the income from our land, we more than
double the value of our lands.

To increase the productiveness of the iand requires careful thought
and study. One hour of rest plus one hour of thoughtful consid-
eration of a definite plan is equal to four hours of scattering manure
or sixteen hours between the handles of a bull-tongue plow. The
productiveness of our land, measured by the cost of production,
determines the degree of success of farming as a business venture.
Productiveness of the soil is not determined by the muscular effort
expended in its tillage, even though supplemented with commer-
cial fertilizers. Many a farmer has confused commercial fertili-
zers with brains. He has tried to substitute commercial fertilizers
for brains. He has tried to substitute the offal and carcass of the
ox and the remains of prehistoric animals for the gray matter lying
dormant in his head.

There is more plant food in one ounce of brain than in a car load
of commercial fertilizers when it comes to a permanent growth of
productiveness.

Commercial fertilizers are a Godsend when properly used and a
curse when used to stimulate the land for present needs. Stimu-
lation to-day lessens the productiveness of to-morrow. We cannot
lessen the cost of production if we lessen productiveness.

The greatest problem confronting the Southern farmer is that
of productiveness. The greatest business opportunity in all this
country lies under our feet. It is the restoration of our unproduc-
tive lands.

The business opportunity of the South is the restoration of the
unproductive soils. It is more profitable to build up unproductive

soils that were once good than it is to farm the average productive
ones. It is provoking to hear a stranger, let alone one of our citi-
zens, speak of the worn-out lands of the South. There is no worn-
out land in the South. If it was once good, it is still good. It may
be unproductive, made so by unbusinesslike methods. We have

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LUIWi SWOCK

sapped its life. We have changed its mechanical condition, and
now it is a dead soil, but one that can easily be brought back to a
high State of productiveness.

It is a common failing to neglect the opportunities at our feet
because they have become commonplace by long association. We
long for the fleshpots of the North or seek the golden opportunities

1. Corn Field of Clarendon Davis. 2. Clarendon Davis’ Cattle on Bermuda
3. Wheat Field of Madison County

of the West, and are led away by a mirage of plenty to lands where
adverse conditions excite our inert energy to conquer ; and we build
prosperous towns, cities, and communities by the brain and muscle
that justly belong to the land of our birth.

I used to think there were some of our lands that Providence
made in order to keep from being a hole in the ground, or just to

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LAVOE Si Ol Crs

hold better portions together. I now believe all lands, of what-
ever character, are intended to be utilized for some good purpose.

In the northwest corner of my home county is a strip of land
known as the “barrens” that a few years ago was considered worth-
less as farm land and could have been bought for $2.50 per acre.
It is an extension of the Highland Rim of Tennessee. As the
Farm Demonstrator of my county, I secured the codperation
of a gentleman sixty-five years of age to farm twenty acres of
his land by the improved methods as outlined by the Department
of Agriculture, with the results that have astonished the whole
country. This gentleman has proved that the Highland Rim
soil is as good as the rest of the world. He raised oats to the value
of $75; hay, $150; corn average, forty-five bushels to the acre,
$276.25; peas grown between the corn rows, $35; one-half bale of
cotton at $12.65; cotton seed, $16 a ton. The total was $850.
After deducting the cost of labor and fertilizer of $125, we have a
net profit of $725, or $36.25 net per acre. In this case it was not the
land; it was the man. It was an illustration where brains were
used. It is an example for the rest of the farmers of the South.
What one man can do all can do, if the use of the same care and
judgment is employed.

The average income over and above cost of taxes, insurance,
labor, and general farm expense of the six and one-half million
farms of this country is $700, or less than $2 a day. Just think of
it—$2! Is this enough for the average farmer? Is this enough
for him to meet his church dues, buy his clothing, his carriage, or
his automobile? The mechanic makes more than this, and no cap-
ital invested other than his brains. Two dollars a day profit is not
enough for the average farmer, and to increase this we must in-
crease productiveness and lessen cost of production and use more
businesslike methods in marketing the crops.

It is a simple matter to increase the producing capacity of our
soil, if we will conform to a few simple rules laid down by nature.
Take, for instance, one of the old, unproductive fields of our farm.
If we would let it alone, Nature would restore it; but, with our as-

Six months’ work on the farm will not produce six months’ in-
come.

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IL WW 1B, (S OVE i

sistance, she will do in five years what it would take her twenty
years to do alone.

The first essential is to add humus to the soil by turning under
some vegetable matter, it matters not what. Plant anything that
will give the greatest growth, and stimulate to the rankest growth
by the use of commercial fertilizers; and when it has reached its
full maturity, turn it under. Then if the soil is deficient in lime,
which is the case with the majority of the soils of the South, add
the ground rock and harrow it in. Few realize the great value of
the sorghum plant as a source of humus. This plant will make

Thrashing

more growth on thin soil than any other. It is said to be very
exhausting to the soil, and it is if we remove the crop; but in our
soil building we must return ali of the growth from our first crops.
If the growth is turned under in the fall and rye sown to be turned
under in the late spring, we will be in shape to sow the land in
clover or peas. Land so treated and sown to clover or peas, with
liberal applications of phosphates and potash, will almost insure a
good crop if the rainfall is sufficient.

When we can grow heavy crops of clover and peas, even with
liberal use of commercial fertilizers, the soil will increase in fertil-
ity, 1f we keep in mind that we must add humus.

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LIWs SWTOCiIX

It is said that $250,000,000 is burnt up every year on the farms
of this country. That means $41 of vegetable matter is burnt up
every year, on an average, to every farm. A soil builder will never
burn up grass, stubble, or even weeds. He knows too well the hu-
mus-forming value of these.

Humus first, then lime, then nitrogen, is the keynote. Humus
“soul of the soil.” Without it we

‘

is placed first because it is the
can never become soil builders. It makes the soil porous, retentive
of heat and moisture, and tends by chemical action to liberate the
mineral plant foods. In short, it makes a dead soil a live soil.

You cannot make money on poor land. Then build it up by per-
sistently feeding it with vegetable matter, be it by plowing it un-
der or feeding the products to stock and returning the manure.
The more you return to the soil, the more it will give back to you,
with a big percentage of profit of its use. ‘This is business.

To be a business farmer does not necessarily mean the posses-
sion of broad acres and unlimited capital, but it does mean that he
is a builder, a constructor, one who is not planting and reaping
without one thought of to-morrow, but one who farms with a view
of increased fertility, one who builds up his acres in order to in-
crease the value of his possessions and the value of citizenship.

Too many farmers aim to buy more land, and thus spread their
limited means over greater acreage, when they have failed to show
their ability to manage what they already possess. ‘There is not
one farmer in the South who is getting all from his land that it is
able to produce. When a farmer shows his ability to manage suc-
cessfully that which he now owns, it is no trouble for him to secure
the means to make improvements or increase his holdings.

He has shown what financial credit he is entitled to, and it is ex-
tended before the asking. It is true in time past that even the pro-
gressive farmer has been handicapped by the lack of ready money
which his credit entitled him to, and then at such exorbitant rates
of interest that it has been the means of retarding the Southern
farmers’ advancement. In fact, farming is the only business that
could have existed, let alone thrive, with such usurious interest they
have been compelled to pay.

The business farmer is no longer handicapped by this condition
of affairs. The lawyer, the doctor, the merchant, the banker, have

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Liwi STOCI&

been made to feel that all their success depends upon the success
of the tiller of the soil; and being men of business, they see and
are ready to extend to the farmer-_every aid and facility that will
better his condition. Some of the bankers of the South have just
realized what agricultural advancement means to them. They are
making a close study of the farmer and his needs, and are extend-
ing the helping hand that has so long been denied the farmer.
They are putting their heads together to devise some means by
which they can extend to the farmer the long-time loans so essential
for constructive purposes. In other words, they see the necessity

Boys’ Corn Club

of long-time loans to the farmer that are so readily available to the
railroad and other like corporations. The national and State bank-
ing laws prohibit this, but this need not discourage the ambitious
farmer. He cannot afford to wait for the legislative bodies to
make laws favoring him. His banker now knows the value of his
collateral, and knows that the business of the business farmer is
most desirable. You have but to show the banker that you are a
business man, however small, and he is ready to help you. Not
you who are satisfied with your present slipshod, soil-robbing, shift-
less, unprofitable methods; not you who are content to work dur-
ing the sunshiny days, six months of the year, and then sit down

Light plows mean light crops.

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LUIWi STOCIX

and eat up the products of your six months’ labor; but the help is for
you who aim to climb higher each year, you who are building up
your soil’s fertility for the needs of to-morrow, you who are not
content to be dictated to by a speculative market that by the tick
of the wire can wipe out the profits of a year’s work. It is to you
who live at home and are industrious and honest.

Credit does not always depend upon what you may possess of
these worldly goods, but more upon what you are and your standard
as a citizen. CLARENDON DAVIS.

TENNESSEE VALLEY A LIVE-STOCK COUNTRY

a

T has been predicted by those who are in a position to know

Q that the northern parts of Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi,

and parts of Kentucky and Tennessee will be the center of

the beef-producing section of this country. In fact, the future must

look to this section for its meat supply. Beef has been produced
cheaper in the South than anywhere else in the world.

Live stock on the farm is the greatest factor in restoring and
maintaining lost fertility. Cattle, hogs, and sheep are the great-
est assets of the farm. The one-crop system reduces fertility;
stock raising produces fertility. The one-crop system reduces hu-

_mus, “the soul of the soil;” stock raising increases the humus.

The one-crop system decreases yields; stock raising increases
yields. The one-crop system is productive of mortgages; live-
stock raising prevents the mortgages.

Live-stock raising is the panacea for all the evils of the present
system of farming now too common to the South. It is the virus
by which we may inoculate ourselves against financial distress
that periodically visits the South. The one-crop system as prac-
ticed in the South has meant a constant warfare against grass.
Grass means live stock, live stock means fertility, fertility means
wealth. When you destroy grass, you destroy wealth.

This is a natural grass country; and had our meadows and pas-
tures the same attention that we have given our other crops, this
section would have been many times more productive, her surface

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LUWwis SOCKS

1. Jersey Bull. 2. Draft Stallion

more pleasing to the eye, and her financial condition of a higher
standard.

In fighting grass, we have been fighting Nature’s good intentions.
No system of farming can hope to be successful that does not as-

Page 14

LUW ib S@O CI

sist and encourage Nature in her efforts to build up the soil’s fer-
tility by growing those crops best adapted to her soil and climate.
It only means financial ruin for the farmer and a setback to Nature.
Notwithstanding the setback grass has had, it has been able to
prove its ability to make good crops and to produce beef, pork, and
mutton at a profit that should have led the Southern farmer to rec-
ognize its worth.

Grass, with its persistency, is soon to be reinforced in its efforts
for a more economical system of farming by the boll weevil. The
boll weevil one year with another will destroy twenty per cent of
our cotton crop, and this means the wiping out of all profits on a
depleted soil. To continue to raise cotton under boll-weevil con-
ditions, and to do so profitably, we must increase and maintain the
soil’s fertility. To wait until the advent of the boll weevil before
making the change would be too late to avoid financial distress.
We must begin now to plant grasses, clovers, and raise the stock
necessary to consume them and convert them into food for man.

The production of cotton can be made profitable even under boll-
weevil conditions, but it must be under a condition where we can
obtain maximum yields with decreased cost of production, and this
is possible only when supplemented by live-stock raising.

Beef shortage is world wide. The United States, once a great
beef-producing country, with a large export trade, has sustained a
decrease of ninety-two per cent in six years. In 1906 the United
States exported 494,000 head, valued at $38,000,000. Im 1912 she
exported 36,000 head, valued at $3,000,000. The decrease has been
systematically, month by month; and it is predicted that our ex-
ports will only be 10,000 head in 1913. In 1912 we imported 326,-
000 head, valued at $5,300,000. In other words, the United States
does not raise enough cattle to feed her own people. This short-
age is not only felt in the United States, but is world wide. Aus-
tralia, once a great cattle-exporting country, has for the past few
years suffered from droughts that have depleted her herds and dis-
couraged her ranchmen. Argentina, whom we have been taught
was a menace to our export trade, has for three years suffered from
droughts and foot and mouth disease, which have made beef-pro-
ducing conditions unfavorable.

The world must be fed. Where is this to come from? Here is

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LiWw is, SO Cix

the Tennessee Valley, where we have proven our ability to raise
beef cheaper than anywhere else. We continue to raise cotton,
and have it thrown up to us that the low price is due to a great
surplus carried over that the manufacturer could not use. Why
continue to raise a surplus of a product when it would be more
profitable to raise a product for which the supply is not equal to
the demand? Does it not seem more rational to wipe out the
great surplus of cotton by devoting less land to its production and

Alabama-Raised Mules

devoting it to the production of beef, for which there is a demand
that cannot be filled?

Those who will take advantage of this situation of supply and
demand are the ones who will reap the benefit. This opportunity
is open to the small farmer, with his four or five cows, as well as the
large farmer, with his forty or fifty. We have the foundation and
need but the pure-bred beef bull to make the start.

We have been for the last year selling our cows and heifers to

Page 16

LUWi, SWOCIK

Northern buyers at prices that seemed good to us. We have con-
gratulated ourselves on being able to rid our farms of this scrub
stuff, and we have had a secret feeling that we got the best of the
trade and really pitied the buyer. Men who would come down here
from the North and make the fool trades we thought they were
making are confined up there in the asylums. Those Northern
buyers will, in a year or two, prove their wisdom in purchasing
what to us would have been a gold mine if we would have but rec-
ognized it in time. ;

The Farm Demonstration Department or Bureau of Plant In-
dustry has aptly sent out the following warning to the Southern
farmers :

“Tf the Western ranchman can afford to pay Southern farmers
good prices for cows, pay the high freight rates to the West, stand
the losses which naturally occur during shipping thin cattle such
long distances, also bear the losses due to change of climate con-
ditions, and then make money on them, why cannot the Southern
farmer, who already owns the cattle as well as the grazing lands,
and who needs the manure upon the soils, keep this stock on the
farm and secure the increased profits? He can, if he will free his
cattle of ticks, increase the efficiency of his pastures by planting
mixtures of lespedeza, bur clover, white clover, or perhaps meli-
lotus, alsike clover, and red top over his pasture lands, and by rais-
ing more hays and forage crops for wintering his stock and finish-
ing them for market. The surplus cattle can then be fattened by
feeding cotton-seed cake on grass, grazing fields of velvet beans,
while feeding some concentrate, or they can be finished in the dry
lot during the winter months. [For winter feeding no roughage has
proved more valuable than silage, as the addition of it to a feeding
ration invariably increases the size of the daily gains and reduces
the cost of them, thereby making greater profits. The quality and
the quantity of silage which can be produced on some of these cheap
iands cannot be surpassed by the high-priced lands of the corn belt,
-whereas the cost of producing it is far less because of the cheap
labor.”

The farmers of the South are, therefore, urged to discontinue

The one-crop system is productive of crop mortgages.

Page 17
2

EIVE Ss LOCK

this wholesale shipping of their female cattle to other States, to
free the pastures of the cattle tick, and to increase the numbers
and quality of their cattle by the use of pure;bred beef bulls. The
progeny will not only grow off faster and make larger and better
cattle, but will be far more profitable to raise and to feed than are
the natives. The soils will be increased in fertility, and manure,
which gives such profitable returns when applied to the cotton
crop, will put yegetable matterinto the soil, thus, reducing, the

Stallion

amount of commercial fertilizer necessary and increasing the avail-
ability of this material. CLARENDON DAVIS.

HOW TO GO INTO LIVE-STOCK FARMING WITH SMALL
EXPENSE AND NO RISK

OUTHERN farming is not going to remain as itis. The big
fact of our time, so far as agriculture is concerned, is that
we are in a period of transition from the old, ruinous, single-

crop system of farming to a sounder and more profitable system

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ENE 1S) 40 Ol IG

of,.general; and live-stock farming. Many farmers seem not yet to
have realized this fact, but it is a fact, just the same. “The new.
Spirit of Southern farming is not .sq,much the spirit of reform as
the spirit of revolution, and the revolution is even now taking

place.” _ It is not only that Southern farmers are practicing better

methods, getting better machinery, making better crops, but that
they are turning away from: the false ideas of a system which
looked only to the crop to be,sold in the fall and accepting the new
ideal of a farming system which looks first of all to the preserva-
tion of the soil and links one year with another in an enduring
effort to add continually to the farm’s productivity and to the prof-
its the farmer shall receive from his work. The South of the future
is going to be a land of flocks and herds, of corn fields and silos,
of big barns and heavy machinery, of meadows and pastures, and
all the things which go with live-stock farming.

This change is not going to come all at once, of course, but very
gradually ; and it is not going to come at all until farmers realize
another big fact: that feeds must come before live stock, and that
the grass will not be sowed nor the legumes planted to supply the
horses and cattle and hogs and sheep, but that these animals will
be grown and fed because of the abundance of feeds and the profits
to be had by utilizing them. A system of live-stock farming and
the profits that come from live-stock farming are alike impossible
without an abundance of feeds. At the very foundation of stock
husbandry are grass-clad fields and well-filled haymows; and until
these are had, any large development of the live-stock industry will
be profitless, if not impossible.

This, then, is the special message I would send the farmers of
Northern Alabama. You have a natural live-stock country, one
adapted to the growing of the grass and grain crops, which are at
the basis of successful stock farming; and with your great advan-
tages of climate over the stock-raising sections of the North; with
the cheapest concentrate feed in the world in your own cotton-
seed meal; with a soil capable, when properly treated, of growing
almost any crop; and with the ability to grow two crops every
year, there is no reason why the Tennessee Valley should not be-
come as well known for fine live stock as Wisconsin or Illinois of
the Kentucky blue-grass section.

Page 19

&

LIVE STOCK

Nor does it take a whole lot of money to go into live-stock farm-
“go into” it at all, in fact; you want to
“srow into” it—that is, you want to grow more pasture and feed
crops, take better care of the stock you have, improve their quality
by breeding only to pure-bred sires, and get other and more highly

3)

ing. You do not want to ‘

?

bred animals for breeding purposes just as you are able. Large

farmers and small can alike follow this plan, and the reward for

each will be both liberal and permanent. E. E. MILLER,
Managing Editor of Progressive Farmer.

PRODUCTIVE SOIL

A HEN a soil produces well, we speak of it as being rich, or

productive; when it fails to yield good crops, we say it is
poor, or worn out. A soil that was originally good may,
by continuous cropping and poor methods in cultivation, become
unproductive, but it can never be worn out. The humus contents
have been destroyed, and it has become a compact, dead soil that
may be brought back to a high state of cultivation if we will study
its needs and farm it in a way that will supply its needs.

A productive soil is literally a live soil. Every minute particle,
so small it cannot be seen with the naked eye, is surrounded by a
film of water, which contains millions and millions of microorgan-
isms that are always busy breaking down soil particles, be it bits
of rock or plants. They are busy little bodies, working in a con-
genial home, converting and dissolving compounds into forms
available as plant foods. Some are busy making available plant
food from materials already in the ground, while others are just
as busy adding plant food to the soil. Of the latter class there is
the bacteria that enables the legumes to extract nitrogen from the
air.

The microorganisms will work for you day and night as long
as you provide them with a congenial home. They will take the
growth of vegetation or the manure you have turned under and
make it a part of the soil. As the cattle and hogs of the farm take
the grasses and grain and convert them into food for man, so will

Page 20

LIVE Sit ©1€ kK

1. Wheat Field of Dan Glessner. 2. Pea Field .

Rains and Fertilizers cannot be substituted for Brains and Cul-
tivators.

Page 21

Liwit SO Cik

the microodrganisms take the animal, organic, and mineral matter
qf the soil and convert them into food for plants.

These beneficial little beings must have plenty of moisture, yet
an excess of water is as detrimental to their growth as not enough
water; hence the land must be well drained. They must have
plenty of organic matter to live on and plenty of air. In other
words, a congenial home or medium in which these microorgan-
isms will live and multiply is a well-drained soil filled with humus-
forming material, as crops turned under or where applications are
made of stable manures.

_ When crop after crop is taken from the soil and nothing given
back, where we pursue the policy of taking that part of the crop
that we can sell and burning the balance in order to clean the land,
we will soon exhaust the humus contents of the soil—that element
that makes the soil retentive of heat and moisture. The soil then
becomes compact, the air cannot circulate through it, and it be-
comes a wet soil in times of excessive rainfall, runs together and
dries and bakes quickly when the sun shines hot. Under these
conditions, the soil is found to become acid, microorganisms be-
come less active and dwindle in numbers and may be entirely de-
stroyed. The soil then becomes a dead soil.

The humus contents of the soil can be readily increased by the
application of barnyard manures or turning under green crops
grown for that purpose. No vegetable matter should ever be
burned on the farms. All cotton and corn stalks, all grass and
weeds should be turned under. No land should be allowed to re-
main bare during the winter if possible. Get it seeded down to
some winter cover crop, this to be plowed under in the spring if
land is to be planted. A winter cover crop prevents the leaching
of the soil by heavy winter rains. The cover crop takes up the
plant food as it becomes available and prevents it from passing off
in the soil water.

The loss caused by our winter rains on a soil left bare of all veg-
tation is estimated by some to be equal to that caused by a crop
taken from the soil during the growing season.

The acidity of the soil is easily detected by the use of blue litmus
paper obtainable at any drug store. Procure some and take small
quantities from different parts of the field; wet these samples thor-

Page 22

IL UWB, (Sl OG Ik

oughly and insert a small strip of the litmus paper in each sample.
lf the paper turns pink, it shows the soil is acid; and this must be
corrected by the application of ground limestone, 1,000 to 3,000
pounds to the acre, applied after the ground is broken, as a top
dressing, then harrowed in.

When a corn crop of, say, forty bushels is gathered from an
acre and the stalks cut and burned, it is equal to taking from the
land fertility enough to produce eighty bushels of corn; for there
is as much plant food consumed in making the stalk as in making
the ear, besides the loss from the beneficial results that would be
derived in failing to turn under the humus-forming material.

If you wish to build up your soil, you must always farm it with
the idea of making it a congenial home for the microorganisms
by turning under organic matter and keeping the land free of acids
by the use of lime. CLARENDON DAVIS.

GRASSES AND PASTURES

sow on a well-prepared seed bed made firm by thorough
cultivation.

For spring seeding the ideal conditions, not only for grass, but
oats, is found in a corn or cotton field that was well tilled the year
previous. Cut the stalks and with disc harrow thoroughly work
up the top soil to a depth of two and one-half or three inches;
smooth down with spike-tooth harrow and sow the grass seed or
sow the oats with the grass seed sown behind the drill. If early
in the season, the grass seed should not be covered; but later on in
the season when the sun shines hot, it is best to cover very lightly
with a brush, a weeder, or a roller.

ff the oats are sown very early—say, in January or first of Feb-
ruary—the grass seeding can be delayed later until oats are up,
running the slant-tooth harrow ahead of the seed sower if plenty
of moisture is in the ground; but if it is inclined to be dry, it is
best to run the harrow after sowing the grass.

Page 23

LUWis, SwUO Cir

Fall seeding of grass is best sown by itself, sown on a loose top
soil and covered with roller. Many have succeeded well and ob-
tained excellent stands of grass sown after the drill on fall-sown
grains. As a usual thing, grasses on fall-sown grain are shaded
too much to make much of a growth by the time the grain is har-
vested and is killed by the hot sun in July and August.

Even when sown with the spring seeding of oats, the oats should
not be as thick as ordinarily sown. One bushel to the acre is
enough when grass is sown with it.

Meadow of D. K. Wall John Hughes’ Pea Field

The grasses that have proven most valuable for the Tennessee
Valley, both for hay and pastures, are: Tall meadow oat, red top,
timothy, orchard and Bermuda; and all the clovers do well in this
section—red, alsike, white, crimson, bur, and Japan clover.

With such a wealth of grasses and clovers that have proven val-
uable and well adapted to this section, there is little excuse for not
having luxuriant pastures, both permanent and rotated, and great
barns and ricks of nutritious hay.

Bermuda is the greatest of all known grasses for permanent pas-

Page 24

LIW 8 STOCK

ture. It will furnish more grazing to the acre than any single grass
or combination of grasses known to the South.

If small bits of sod are dropped in three-foot furrows, covered
and cultivated as you would corn, always covering up as much as
possible at each plowing, the grass will cover the ground before
fall. When not cultivated, it will in two or three years make a per-
fect sod.

For rotated pastures of grass, timothy, red top, orchard and tall
meadow oat grass, with some red or alsike clover, all sown to-
gether, makes an excellent mixture for good loamy lands. For
the thin lands, tall meadow oat, red top, Japan, alsike, and a light
sprinkling of white clover have been found to give excellent pas-
ture.

Red top and alsike clover will do their best on low, moist soils.

One of the most popular mixtures in the red lands of East Ten-
nessee for pasture and hay is tall oat grass and alsike clover.

No farm, however small, is complete without its permanent pas-
ture of Bermuda; and this should be supplemented with rotated
pastures of the tame grasses and the clovers for spring and fall
grazing. It is a difficult matter for those on heavy clay lands to
have an all-winter pasture, even with the fall-sown grains, due to
the puddling of the soil by the stock running on it, there being few
days in January and February when ground is dry enough to hold
up the stock. It is here that the silo will fill in the gap and virtu-

ally permit the raising of stock on pastures the year round.
CLARENDON DAVIS.

CORN

O successfully raise corn, we must begin our preparation at
© least one or two years before planting. No land will pro-
= duce a profitable corn crop that is not in good mechanical
‘condition, and we cannot get it in a good mechanical condition
unless we have humus in the soil. To get humus, we must plow
under a crop of clover, peas, or even sorghum and peas in the fall
or early spring. Humus makes the soil retentive of heat and mois-

Page 25

LIVE STOCK

Corn

,

A barbed-wire fence roofed with the “ canopy of heaven” makes

an expensive tool shed.

Page 26

LUIW is SWOCIK

ture, and tends by chemical action to liberate the mineral plant
foods.

It is very doubtful if advisable to break a heavy clay soil early
in the fall for corn, unless it is covered with a heavy growth of veg-
etation. When a heavy growth is turned under early, it has time
to partially decay and the ground has time to settle. The freeze
and thawing of a freshly turned sod lessens the liability of damage
from cutworms in the spring. A heavy clay land deficient of hu-

D. K. Wall’s Corn J. B. Woodall’s-Corn Field
With Peas in the Middle

mus, broken early in the fall, will be found to be so compact and
run together by our heavy winter rains that the work necessary
with disc harrows to get a proper seed bed will be found more ex-
pensive than the late winter or spring broken land.

Late fall and early winter are the proper times to break land
deep. Often in the spring when the ground seems dry enough to
plow, you will discover that only the top three inches are in con-

Page 27

LUWE STOCK

dition; and if you set your plow to run five inches deep, you are
plowing two inches of soil that is too wet. This is a very common
mistake, and many have wondered why their corn “fired” or the
yield was so low, when they had taken so great pains to break deep.

As the time for planting draws near, the ground should be thor-
oughly pulverized by roller or drag disc harrow. ‘Time spent in
thorough preparation before planting is time profitably spent. Use
the best seed you can procure; seed that you have field selected.
A little attention to the selection of seed will insure a perfect stand
and an increased yield.

The thinner the land, the more space the corn should have. The
most common practice in this section where corn is checked is to
plant three and one-half feet by three feet ten inches, leaving two
stalks to the hill on the rich lands and one stalk on the thin parts.
Check corn is more economical of cultivation, as the hoe is never
required.

On thin land, where corn must be helped out by commercial fer-
tilizers, it is best to drill in wide rows; and at the second cultiva-
tion plant a row of peas in the middles, and the subsequent culti-
vation of corn will cultivate the peas.

If early in the corn-planting season, plant deep enough to insure
moisture in case of a dry spell. Corn is more often planted too
deep than too shallow. Just before the corn comes up, it is best to
run over the field with a slant-tooth harrow; and when the corn
comes up, start cultivation as soon as practical, giving it a thor-
ough, deep cultivation. The cultivations should not be, over two
and one-half inches in seasons of plenty of moisture. During sea-
sons of dry weather the mulch should be established early and never
be deepened in subsequent cultivations, for fear of destroying the
feeding roots. In the cultivation of corn one must remember that
the corn. roots are matted across a four-foot row when the corn is
only two feet high. To disturb these roots lessens the yield of
corn. Cultivation of a light, shallow nature should continue until
the corn is nearly made. Planting in water furrows has proven
beneficial for late planting, and many claim that corn thus planted
is not so apt to be blown down during storms.

Too often corn yields are diminished greatly after “laying by,”
a shower, followed by hot sun, forming a crust and permitting the

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LIW iE SWOCIx

moisture to escape just at a time when the corn needs the most
moisture. Never permit a crust to form while the corn is filling.
Work the ground from row to row with some light tool like the
spring-tooth cultivator. Some seasons permit plowing to stop
when the corn is beginning to tassel; then again the light cultiva-
tors have to continue until the corn is made.

The ideal cultivation of corn is often the shallow, but during ad-
verse weather conditions shallow cultivation will be of little ben-

A Corn-Club Boy’s Corn “Jungle” A Corn Club Boy

efit when the soil has become compact and the weeds and grass
have a good start due to excessive rains.

It is then that the ingenuity of the farmer is taxed. He must re-
establish his depth of loose soil and destroy the weeds and grass
with any tool best suited to the work, even though he has to do
some root pruning. This root pruning is not as detrimental to the
yield as that caused by a compact soil filled with weeds and grass.

CLARENDON DAVIS.

Page 29

IE Wis SO C6

BEEF CATTLE IN ALABAMA...

HE work of eradicating the “ lexas-fever”’ tick is progress-

y) ing satisfactorily in the South. Every year new areas are
“= ‘freed from the tick, and with the progress of the work there
comes an added interest in all kinds of cattle production. When
the ticks in a county are exterminated, renewed interest begins to

be immediately manifested in the beef-cattle business, as the South-

J. H. Cummings’ Cattle

ern farmers now realize that the “ Texas-fever ” tick has been prac-
ucally the only drawback to the cattle business in the past. When
the tick is finally exterminated, no section of the United States will
be as well suited to beef production as the South, because of its
mild climate, long grazing season, and cheap lands.

There are many reasons why the Southern States should raise
more beef cattle than are being raised at the present time. First,
the South, under the present system of farming, has thousands of

Page 30

LIVE STOCK

acres—and good ones, too—which are not being used at all. Sta-
tistics tell us that only about forty per cent of the tillable or arable
land of the South is being used. Sixty per cent of the land is lying
idle, and returns to the owner not a cent in wealth. All of the
lands cannot be used as cotton lands, because, first, there are not
enough people to work the lands in any such way; and, second,
many of these pauper acres are not suitable for cultivation. In
fact, many acres that are now under cotton cultivation should be
turned into permanent pastures and grazed with live stock. No
State can become wealthy when only forty per cent of the land
capital is being used. The grocer or the banker or the hardware
merchant could not possibly make a profit on his business if he used
only forty per cent of his capital; and the farmer cannot hope to be
successful in his operations until he begins to make) use of at least
a reasonable proportion of his capital. No farming business can be
made successful when only $4,000 out of a possible $10,000 is being
used.

Then, again, beef cattle should be more generally introduced,
because of the good they do in building up and maintaining soils.
Under the present system of cotton farming, the soils are becom-
ing poorer and poorer. With the introduction of cattle, the soil
will begin to be buiit up. Director Thorne, of the Ohio Station,
has been making tests with barnyard manure for several years,
applying the manure upon a plat of ground upon which was run-
ning a three years’ rotation of corn, wheat, and clover. Eight tons
of manure an acre were applied. The average yearly increase an
acre, following the one application, was as follows:

Corn, 14.7 bushels at 70 cents a bushel......... $10 29
Corn stover, 744 pounds at $6a ton............ 2 38
Wheat, 8.36 bushels at $1 a bushel............ 8 36
Wheat straw, 897 pounds at $4 aton.......... 1 79
Clover hay, 686 pounds at $12a ton........... 4 12

Total value 8 tons of manure............... $26 79

ARotralvalliem Ee tonmotnnanttneem ener 3 35)

_ The chauffeur of a one-mule-power bull tongue will never make
a record-breaking corn crop.

Page 31

UW SWOCuuK

He further states that the value of farm manure can be materially
increased by balancing the manure with the addition of a carrier
of phosphorus. The farm manures are too high in nitrogen as
compared with the other elements. By balancing stable manure,
the value of eight tons was increased $12.20, after deducting the
cost of the material used for the balancing of the manure. This
is $1.53 a ton, or, when added to the $3.35 above, brings the total
possible value of each ton of manure up to $4.88. During a feed-
ing period of one hundred days each steer will produce at least
1.5 tons of manure. This profit should be added to the feeding
or direct profits. The Arkansas Station (Bulletin 68) made a test
to determine the value, to each succeeding crop, of growing peas
in the corn, gathering the corn, and then grazing both the peas and
the stalks by the steers. The steers were being fed some cotton
seed in addition to the grazing. As the result of this crop of peas
and the grazing, the succeeding cotton crop was increased 626.5
pounds of seed cotton over the area where corn alone had been
grown. A third lot was planted to corn, and the increase in corn,
due to the pea crop and the grazing, was 14 bushels per acre.

A third reason why beef should be more generally produced in
the South is that there is a demand for it, and the demand should
be met in order that the money may be kept at home. During the
year of 1907 there were about 15,151 home-raised animals slaugh-
tered in the city of Birmingham (this includes cattle, veal, hogs,
sheep, and kids), while there were 36,097 Western animals brought
into the city and slaughtered. In addition to all this, thousands of
pounds of cured meats were also retailed over the city.

This money should be kept at home and added to the Southern
wealth. Packing houses are now being built throughout the South,
and good markets are assured for the beef animals which the farmer
produces.

The fourth reason offered in favor of beef production is that, as
our farmers learn the value of diversification in farming operations,
there will be an increased amount of roughage, as corn, fodder, cow-
pea, and clover hays, soy beans, etc., which many times can be mar-
keted more profitably through the beef animals than in any other
way. ‘The beef cattle serve as important machines for converting
the surplus fodders into valuable barnyard manure, which gives to

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Livin STOCK

the growing crops not only the benefits of its fertilizing elements,
but increases the mechanical condition of the soil by the addition
of that important compound—humus. No animal can take the
place of the beef steer in making use of the winter corn and cot-
ton fields.

Beef cattle are peculiarly suited to fit the farming operations of
the South. The farms are large, and many acres are not being
used because of the lack of sufficient labor. At present there is no
better way to put the whole farm to work than by introducing beef
cattle into the system of farming. They require but a small amount
of labor in addition to that used upon the average cotton farm.
The hog, while he deserves a prominent place upon almost every
farm, cannot be made to use all of the large uncultivated areas on
the farms, for he is not strictly a grazing animal. Many farmers
who have the large uncultivated areas are not now sufficiently
skilled in the handling of live stock to introduce sheep or dairy cat-
tle, as the sheep and dairy business require more skill than the
beef business. Then, too, the dairy business requires an increase
in the amount of labor used upon the farm, and the labor item is one
that many farmers are trying to reduce.

Pastures First, Then Live Stock

The question of the introduction of more and better live stock
of all kinds into the South is worthy of the careful and thoughtful
attention of every one of our Southern farmers; but, unfortunately,
many people do not understand that a man must be a good farmer,
a good crop and pasture producer, before he can be a good and suc-
cessful stock farmer—that is, many are prone to view the live-stock
business from the wrong end. Many farmers labor under the im-
pression that the proper way to start into live stock is to first
procure the live stock.

The first thing to do is to establish pastures. This method of
starting is all right if the farmer is so fortunate as to have fences
to hold the animals when they arrive and good pastures within the
fences for the animals to graze upon when released from the ship-
ping crate. But the man who has never maintained stock upon
the farm is usually not equipped with fences and pastures, and this
kind of farmer cannot be impressed too strongly with the thought

Page 33
3

LUW is, STOCK

that pastures come before live stock and that pastures are essen-
tial to profitable live-stock production. The farmer who is not
properly equipped with pastures should be made to know that the
first step in the handling and feeding of live stock is the establish-
ment and preparation of both permanent and temporary pasture
crops, and that the animals themselves should be the last addition

Red Clover and a Stock Raiser

to a well-equipped and properly appointed live-stock farm. Pro-
spective live-stock men should understand that there is time enough
to bring the stock to the farm after the feed and pastures are made
and ready for consumption.

Thousands of farmers all through the South have gone into the
stock business backwards, and a thousand other farmers are now
thinking of traveling in the same way. The backward method of

Page 34

LIVE STOCK

introducing oneself into the live-stock business is to bring the ani-
mals to the farm before the fences, fields, and pastures are ready to
receive them. When the live-steck business is inaugurated im-
properly, the animals are necessarily put up in small pens or lots
and fed solely on high-priced feeds or turned out into fields poorly
fenced and poorly sodded with grass. Such unfavorable condi-
tions soon discourage the owner. He soon realizes that a mistake
was made in getting the stock before the pastures. In short, the
unfortunate owner soon realizes that he went into the business
backwards, and he usually continues to back until he has com-
pletely. backed out of the live-stock business.

Don’t go into the business backwards.

The farmer who has had such an experience knows why he failed.
He also knows that if he had started right there would have been
no failure; but the unfortunate thing about it is that the neighbors
oftentimes do not know, and they naturally conclude that live stock
cannot profitably be made a part of the Southern system of farm-
ing. It is far better for both the individual owner and the coun-
try that no start at all be made in live stock than for a start to be
made in such a way as to insure failure.

We do not need to give special illustrations to prove that farm-
ers who have tried to grow and produce animals without pastures
as a basis almost always fail. Neither do we need to give special
illustrations to prove that in almost every case where stock have
been kept at a profit, pastures were responsible for the success.

The man who realizes that the pastures afford the cheap feeds
for all kinds of live stock, that the establishment of pastures is the
very basis of successful live-stock production, that a man must be a
good farmer before he can be a good and successful live-stock
owner, never, or seldom, sees the time when his animals fail to ren-
der an exceedingly satisfactory profit. The farmer who has good
pastures soon learns that they save from fifty to seventy-five per
cent of the high-priced grains.

In short, the chief business of the live-stock farmer is to have
good pastures as many months of the year as possible. To pro;
duce live stock at the highest profit, the animal should be made to

think it is summer all the time.

Pay with a check; for when cashed, it is the best form of receipt.

Page 35

LiIWwit STOCK

The Kind of Cattle

No one should be made to think that money can be made on
beef cattle, even with the very best system of pastures, unless goud

¢

cattle are raised. By “good cattle” it is not necessarily meant
that they must all be pure-bred animals, but it is meant that the
male must be a pure-bred animal of some one of the recognized
beef breeds. To begin with, the cows may be, and necessarily must
be, the common cows of the county. But it should be understood
that no progress can possibly be made towards better cattle and
more money when the common bulls of the county are also em-
ployed. This has been done already year aiter year, and nothing
but disappointment has resulted. Pure-bred bulls should always
be used; and each farmer, before beginning the beef-cattle busi-
ness, should decide upon the breed best suited to his particular farm
and locality, and then everlastingly stick to that breed. When it
becomes necessary to change bulls to avoid inbreeding, never
change the breed; always stick to the breed you started with.
When this is done, it will be only a few years until a good herd is
built up which any man may be proud of.

The Breeding Herd

While farmers differ in their opinion as to whether bulls should
be allowed to run with the cows, the writer believes that the best
plan, when everything is considered, is to have the bulls be with
the cows during the breeding season, but remove them just as soon
as the season is past. Of course, breeders of pure-bred animals
could not follow this plan. In Alabama the calves should come
during the early spring months. Under average Alabama farm
conditions it is better to have no calf at all than a late one, so the
bull should be taken away from the cows early enough to avoid the
raising of late calves.

If the pasture is of good quality and abundant, the cows and
calves will require but very little attention during the summer
months. Ordinarily no supplementary feeds, except salt, will be
used during the pasture season.

But when fall arrives, both the mothers and the calves must have
extra feed and care. The calves must now be taken away from
their mothers and fed alone. The mothers themselves must be

Page 36

Liwit STOCK

1. Orchard. 2. Peach Orchard

kept in condition for producing the next crop of spring calves. If
the mothers be expected to produce large and strong calves and
nourish them well after they are born, they must receive both good
care and attention throughout the cold months. By this it is not

Page 37

Livi STOCK

meant that these cows must be fed all winter on high-priced feeds
altogether. They should not, however, be permitted to run down
noticeably in flesh, but it is not necessary to make use of large
amounts of high-priced feeds in order that the weights of the cows
be maintained. The breeding herd should be largely maintained
upon cheap roughage, some of which may be entirely unsalable.
The kind of roughage used will vary. Some farmers make large
use of oat straw and corn stover. “A cow may be wintered in good
shape on oat straw and corn stover when they are supplemented
with two pounds of clover hay a day. ‘This is cheap ration, and
one which, under ordinary farm conditions, will prove to be satis-
factory. Corn silage, when available, is undoubtedly one of the
cheapest and best feeds to be used as the principal part of the win-
ter ration of breeding cows. A daily ration of about eighteen
pounds of corn silage, plus two pounds of clover or cowpea hay,
together with all the oat straw the cow will eat, will be sufficient
feed to cause a small increase in weight during the cold months.
This ration, as the farmer knows, is an exceedingly cheap one. The
breeding cows should be made to use the cheap roughage of the
farm. ‘This is one of the main uses of the beef animal on the farm.
The business of producing beef cattle cannot be made a profitable
one when only high-priced feeds are fed.

Fattening the Calves and Steers

The beef-cattle business can be, and usually is, divided into two
parts—breeding and fattening. As a rule, the man who raises the
calf does not finish it on his own farm for the market. He usually
sells it to a neighboring farmer who makes a business of fattening
and preparing the calf or steer for the market. Thus the feeder
oftentimes has no interest at all in raising the calves. Probably
the ideal condition, at least for Alabama and adjacent States, is for
the calf to be raised and finished on the same farm. But this ideal
condition can seldom be realized, because the man who raises the
calf has, as a rule, only a few cows, and can seldom afford to take
the time and trouble to fatten the few calves which these cows bring
each year. Even if the small farmer were to fatten these few
calves each year, he could seldom afford to ship them to the large
markets, so he is at the mercy of the local buyers. As a result of

Page 38

(ie)

LW § OO Cx

this condition of affairs, the professional feeder has developed.
His business is to collect calves and steers into car-load lots and
prepare them for the open market.

The farmer who has as many as thirty breeding cows on his farm
should make it a rule to fatten their offspring himseli. He can
seldom afford to sell the calves to the professional feeder. The
feeder usually makes money on the process of fattening, and the
man who raises calves in sufficient numbers should keep this extra
profit at home. Furthermore, the farmer who has from eight to
twelve calves or steers ready for the feed lot will usually find it
profitable to buy a sufficient number of feeders to complete the
load, and he can then finish all of them on his own farm.

There are many ways of disposing of beef calves or cattle, and
the farmer should be watchful to avoid methods by which money
might be lost. It is possible to raise beef cattle properly and by
selling them improperly to lose money on the business in just the
same way that it is possible to raise good apples, potatoes, and
peaches and lose money on them when the marketing part of the
business is not studied and given proper attention. When beef
cattle are bred, fed, and marketed in a scientific and businesslike
manner, satisfactory profits should be realized.

The farmer who raises calves is often at a loss to know at what
age they should be disposed of. The spring calf may be sold the
subsequent fall. It may be fattened during the winter months and
sold as a fat yearling calf; it may be kept on the farm until it is from
two to four years of age and then sold to a professional feeder; or
the mature steer may be fattened on the farm where it was raised
instead of being sold to a feeder. On account of the various meth-
ods which it is possible to adopt tor disposing of beef animals, the
owner is often in doubt as to the most profitable manner of han-
dling and disposing of his crop of calves. In the past our farmers
and planters insisted on keeping the offspring of their beef cows
until they were from three to four years old, but many inquiries
_are now made as to the advisability of fattening the calves so as to
dispose of them by the time they are a year old.

There may be “no plows in the pawn shop,” but plenty of them
are covered with rust and chattel mortgages.

Page 39

LWW 12, SWOC ks

Two or three points can be urged in favor of this system. First,
more breeding animals can be kept upon a farm when the off-
spring are disposed of at an early age than when they are held and
sold as steers. Second, the younger the animal, the cheaper each
pound of beef is made. Third, the money invested is turned more
rapidly when the calves are sold at a young age.

Fattening Yearling Calves

During the winters of 1910-1911, 1911-1912, and 1912-1913, the
writer, working in cooperation with the Bureau of Animal Industry
at Washington, studied the question of fattening beef calves dur-
ing their first winter and selling them the following spring when
they were about one year old. In the first test the calves, which
averaged 338 pounds in weight at the beginning of the fattening
period (November 17), were divided into three lots and fed upon
different feeds. The first lot was fattened on a ration made up of
cotton-seed meal, cotton-seed hulls, and alfalfa hay. The second
lot of calves was fed a grain ration of cotton-seed meal and corn-
and-cob meal in the proportion of two to one, cotton-seed hulls, and
alfalfa hay. The third lot was fed the same feeds exactly as those
given to the second lot, except that the relationship between the
cotton-seed meal and hulls was reversed. They were all fed under
a good shelter. Calves will not do well unless they are protected
from the cold winds and rain. They all made good gains, making
1.71, 1.76, and 1.83 pounds per calf per day in the respective lots.
When they were sold, March 17, their average weights were 541, 543,
and 546 pounds in the various lots. When these calves were taken
from their mothers, they had cost 3% cents a pound. When they
were sold, March 17, at Cincinnati, each one hundred pounds
brought $5.01, $5.11, and $5.26 in Lots 1, 2, and 3, respectively; so
they netted a satisfactory profit above all expenses of raising and
fattening. This proved to be a good way to dispose of the corn
and alfalfa hay, as the corn was sold, by means of the calves, for
95 cents to $1.90 a bushel, while the hay was marketed through
them for $20.72 to $21.25 a ton.

In the second test, fifty-two calves, which averaged 313 pounds
in weight when the fattening period began on December 10, were
fattened on a ration made up of cotton-seed meal, cotton-seed hulls,

Page 40

LI Vi Shi OlG ke

1. One of Many Clear Streams. 2. A Farm in Madison County

and cowpea hay. The calves were fed from December 7 to March
29, when they were sold at New Orleans at $5.55 per hundred
weight. These calves also did well, as they gained at an average
daily rate of 1.24 pounds. At the end of the test they had attained

Page 41

Vie Sh ORGS

an average weight of 452 pounds, and were probably ten to eleven
months old on the average. It cost 3 cents a pound to raise these
calves up to weaning time; they sold, as stated above, for $5.55 per
hundred weight. They also realized an exceedingly satisfactory
profit, as each calf netted a clear profit of $3.50 above all expenses
of raising and fattening. It is true that not much hay was fed
(more could have been fed at a profit), but what was fed was sold
from the farm by means of the calves for $56.61 a ton. Hay and
rough feeds can almost always be sold by means of calves for more
money than can be secured for these roughage when sold in the
raw state.

It should be added that all of the above calves were good ones;
they were not scrubs. It would have been impossible to have made
profits if scrubs had been used. These calves, however, were not
pure-bred animals; they were only grades which had been secured
by the use of pure-bred bulls on the native cows.

Fattening Steers

In both the West and the South there are some farmers who pre-
fer to keep the offspring until they reach an age of from two to
three years. When this is the case, there are two general ways of
preparing them for the market. They may be fattened during the
winter months on cotton-seed meal and hulls or other combinations
of feeds, or they may be fattened during the summer months on
pasture and sold some time at the end of the pasture season. Each
system has its peculiar advantages. The main advantage in
feeding during the winter months are: (1) The feeder has better
control of the manure; (2) the farm work is not so urgent during
the winter months; and (3) many farmers can feed cattle during
the cold months who have no pastures for summer feeding. The
chief advantages in fattening steers during the pasture season are:
(1) As a rule, one can make more clear money on steers which are
fed on pasture than when fed in dry lots; (2) the labor of feeding
in the summer time is a very small item, as the cattle are fed only

The head of the family should not be the only one having a bank
account. The wife, daughter, and son should start a savings ac-
count, drawing four per cent interest.

Page 42

Livi SWOCik

once a day; and (3) the pastures are rapidly built up from year
to year, and without the expense of hauling manure.

In winter fattening one has the choice of many feeds, but there
are three or four feeds which can be used to the greatest advan-
tage. As the cheap and damaged roughage of the farm should be
fed to the breeding rather than to the fattening animals, we will
assume that the cheap straws, the stover, and the damaged hays
are all used in another direction. However, if there are no breeding
animals or stock cattle on the farm, these cheap feeds should con-
stitute a part of the ration for the fattening steers. These cheap
feeds must be saved; they must not be allowed to rot on the farm;
they are valuable. The writer has tried many feeds and combina-
tions of feeds for fattening steers during the winter months, and he
has found only one that is better tnan cotton-seed meal and hulls.
The ration that is superior to cotton-seed meal and hulls is cotton-
seed meal, hulls, and corn silage. Of course, the majority of our
farmers do not now have silos, and for those who do not have them
at the present time it will be a difficult thing to find a ration bet-
ter and more economical than cotton-seed meal and hulls, especially
when they are supplemented with one of the cheap roughage feeds
of the farm. The writer fed one bunch of cattle on cotton-seed
meal and hulls; another bunch on cotton-seed meal, hulls, and
Johnson-grass hay; and a third bunch on cotton-seed meal, hulls,
and corn silage. On the first bunch a clear profit of $6.97 was
made on each steer; on the second bunch $5.50 was made on each
steer; and on the third bunch, the silage-fed cattle, a clear profit of
$7.68 was realized on each animal.

When steers are fed during the summer season on pasture, they,
as a rule, must be purchased, if the owner does not raise them him-
self, the previous fall. It is practically impossible to buy steers to
advantage after the arrival of spring. Now, how shall these steers
be cared for and fed during the winter months? Ii they are to be
fattened during the subsequent summer, it is unwise to try to
make them gain during the winter months. It is a fundamental
principle in feeding steers that the more they gain during the win-
ter months, the less they will gain the subsequent summer. So
these steers should be fed on the cheapest feeds the farm affords.
They should not, of course, be permitted to become weakened dur-

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LUWi SWOCIS

ing the cold months. These are the very animals, however, that
should be made to make use of the stock fields, of the straw stacks,
and of the cheap stover and damaged hays. The farmer who has
silage may use a small amount of this succulent feed to advantage.
Grains and high-priced feeds should be used sparingly with these
steers. The owner should look forward to making the gains the
following summer ; then they can be made cheaply.

As soon as grass comes, the steers should be turned upon it and
fed a small amount of cotton-seed cake each day about sundown,
if they are to be sold as fat cattle at the end of the season. It will
pay to feed the small amount of cotton-seed cake along with the
pasture. There is no doubt about this. The writer has tested this
out thoroughly. For five years we fattened one bunch of cattle
on pasture—nothing but pasture. Right by their sides were other
cattle which were fattened on the same kind of pasture, with three
and one-half pounds of cotton-seed cake per steer per day as a sup-
plement. The steers which were fattened on pasture alone re-
turned a clear profit of $5.69 each, while those which received the
cotton-seed cake as a supplement returned an average profit of
$7.08 each. It paid to feed the cake. DAN T. GRAY,

Professor of Animal Industry, State of North Carolina.

MONEY IN FEEDING BEEF CATTLE

N the fall of 1912, Mr. J. H. Cummings, of Chase, Ala., pur-
‘ iA chased thirty-six head of cattle and fed them on his farm,
selling them in the spring at a handsome profit. His suc-
cess, which he has given us in figures, should convince the most
skeptical of the profits to be made with beef cattle fed silage.

Mr. Cummings paid for his silo and all his work and had left a
wide margin of profit and eighty per cent of the fertility contained
in the feed left on the farm. Had there been more silage, he could
have eliminated the cost of the cotton-seed hulls. These cattle had
only eight acres of silage, which was not quite enough, and this
had to be supplemented with the cotton-seed hulls.

Mr. Cummings has pointed out the way to a money-making prop-

= »)

Page 44

EPG SOK CHES

osition to the farmers of the Tennessee Valley that will add fer-
tility to the soil and eliminate the cost and worry of the present
tenant system, besides the money return that insures a cash bal-
ance for the year’s work, as the following figures will show:

36 head; cost, 20,732 pounds at 4 cents...... $ 829 28
11% tons cotton-seed meal at $24.......... 276 00
30) TOMS GUAGE AE Gono coaceossoosovocebocus 150 00
BOntoncahullseateS owe, weather. ea: eke oniea eae 150 00

ANGtAlECOSt oe Se Sma ey see ara com be meee $1,405 28
36 head sold, 29,499 pounds at $6.85......... $2,020 70
INES ESS ANIC Cian tac tote eat ceca eee heuer aie eens te 200 00

ME OLAUERE LUNIA ss ae eee te teeny ears cok eegneennes $2,220) 70

Leaving a profit of $815.42 on an investment of $1,405.28 for the
short feeding period of a little over four months.

Mr. Cummings paid $200 for his silo, and from his last year’s
experience he could well afford to buy a silo every year.

ADVANTAGES OF LIVE STOCK AND SILOS

({) thought has been given to dairying and live-stock

interests in the Southern States in the last few years.
* This has been caused partly by the advent of the cotton
boll weevil.

Alabama holds exceptional advantages, especially along the Ten-
nessee Valley. We need to change our system of farming by di-
versification ; and to do this, live-stock interests are sadly needed.

With our mild climate and long growing seasons, we have over-
looked the advantages which stand out so prominently before us.

The high prices of meats to-day and the millions of dollars that
go annually out of the South for dairy products should make us
give these industries serious thought. With dairying and live
stock we are continually turning over our money, and at the same

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LiWwis SOC

time building up our farms from the valuable manure from our
herds. With the dairy cow, we have a monthly cash business. Be- 7
sides this, a cow is good for ten years and gives us a calf each year,
from which we can soon build up a good herd. Start with a few

J. H. Cummings’ Silo

good cows and breed them to a thoroughbred bull, take care of the
heifer calves, and before you realize it you will have a dairy herd
which is a constant source of income.

Using a check book denotes businesslike methods and lerds dig-
nity to the user.

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LIuwis SlO CK

Live stock is a factory to the farm in which the crops grown are
consumed ; and where the manure is properly cared for, two-thirds
of these crops are returned to the soil. Too much of our soil is
lacking in humus, caused by the lack of diversification and live
stock. With proper cultivation, our soil should improve and be-
come more productive; and these soils can be vastly improved
with live stock on the farms and the leguminous crops which form
a great part of their feeding rations. ,

Where cotton is the principal crop, the farmer is generally short
of cash through the growing season; but with a small dairy, for
instance, he always has a cash income, which makes him more in-
dependent and gives him a better standing in his respective com-
munity.

Good cattle, with proper care and feeding, is the secret of suc-
cess; and the proper feeds can be grown on the farm, and should
not be bought from the mills. Both beef and dairy cattle need an
abundance of rough feeds and forage, such as hay and silage. We
have an abundance of forage crops to choose from, such as cow-
peas, soy beans, velvet beans, vetch, and the different varieties of
clovers, practically all of which can be grown in this Tennessee
Valley.

With reference to silage, this is one of the cheapest and most
economical feeds produced, and no farm with ten or fifteen head of
stock can afford to be without a silo. Silage makes a bulky suc-
culent feed, of which all cattle are very fond at any time of the year.
They thrive on this feed, and it keeps them in a healthy condition.
It puts meat on the backs of beef cattle and increases the mill flow
from a dairy cow. Practically any crop can be cut up and put in
the silo, though corn seems to be the ideal crop. Corn needs to be
put in the silo at what is known as “ fodder-pulling time,” or in the
advance roasting-ear stage. With the silo, we save our entire crop
of corn; but where the stalks are left in the field, we lose about forty
per cent of its value. The cost of a silo is small compared to its
value, and it will pay any farmer to investigate this money-making,
crop-saving device. Silage to cattle is what canned vegetables are
to our tables out of the growing season. In building silos, we need
community spirit, which will reduce the cost of filling our silos.
It takes an engine and a cutter to put this feed in the silo, but one

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LUIWB STOCK

cutter and engine will easily fill the silos at half a dozen or more
farms. Silage is worth at least five dollars per ton, and it should

Silo Built and Filled Within Ten Days; Capacity, 120 Tons; Cost, $120

be grown and put in the silo for two dollars a ton. An acre of good
corn will make ten tons of silage.

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LUuwis © w@Cis

Many Southern farmers have a few cows and heifers on their
farms, and they are selling these to men who offer them what seems
to the farmer like fancy prices. Keep these cattle on your farms
and breed them up, as other people realize the scarcity of breeding
cattle. When you sell these cattle, you are selling the foundation
of the cattle industry on your farms. The high prices of meats in
the last few years have caused cattle buyers to scour the country,
and thousands of our Southern cattle are being shipped into the
Northwest. Dairy and beef cattle, poultry, and hogs mean more
money and better farms, and we have the market if we will only
produce the goods. G. W. HUMPHREY, :

Dairy Expert, Southern Railroad.

HOG RAISING IN ALABAMA

HE production of swine for market is not a specialized in-

) dustry in Alabama, but should be, and would be profitable,
—_ especially when associated with other lines of farming.
Numerous beginners are seeking information on the care and man-
agement of hogs, and even experienced swine breeders are asking

for advice.

It is my purpose to advise the beginner and answer a number of

questions which frequently confront the everyday hog raiser.

Importance of Type

The farmer who would succeed in hog breeding must have a
well-founded knowledge of the two types of swine. By “type”
is meant the general conformation of the animal. All breeds are
included in the two types—that is, the lard type and the bacon type.
The breeds may differ in color, shape of head, or hang of ear; but
the general conformation is practically the same. The Poland-
“China, Duroc-Jersey, Berkshire, and Chester-White are known as
the lard hogs. They are broad, deep, heavy-fleshed hogs, and are
of American origin. They have been developed by selection and
continued feeding on a fat-producing ration. The bacon type, on
the contrary, is a long, narrow, deep, thin-fleshed conformation.
Page 49

4

Liye SWwO Ck

The large Yorkshire and Tamworth are the principal breeds of the
bacon type. They are of foreign origin, and have been developed
on nitrogenous rations. As the result of careful breeding and
feeding, the bacon breeds have been developed to a high state of
perfection, and make the best quality of pork.

As conditions in Alabama are unlike those in the corn-belt States,
where the great majority of hogs are produced, the question often
is asked: “ Why not produce the bacon hog in Alabama?” A ma-
jority of experiments show that all breeds of the same type do

Duroc Hogs

equally as well under similar conditions. “The bacon hog, com-
pared with the lard hog, with which he comes in competition,
dresses but seventy to seventy-five per cent. “he dressed weight,
compared to the live weight, practically decides the value of all
hogs in the great market of the Central West. On this account,
and the fact that packers can secure and utilize a sufficient supply
of immature and unfinished lard hogs in place of true bacon hogs,
there is as yet no well-established market or demand for the latter

class of animals. Although conditions in certain localities of this

Page 50

Liwit STO Cik

State are suitable for the production of bacon hogs of high quality,
their breeding and feeding should not be undertaken in competi-
tion with the lard hog, unless in particular centers the demand is
sufficient to insure prices leaving a profit over the cost of produc-
tion.

The Selection of a Breed

Having studied the two types of swine and decided that, at pres-
ent, the lard type of hog is, in most cases, preferable for market
production by Alabama farmers, the question next arises as to
which breed of lard hogs should be selected. The four leading
breeds of lard hogs may be classed according to numbers, as fol-
lows: Poland-China, Duroec-Jersey, Berkshire, and Chester-White.
Each of these breeds is well established, and possesses and trans-
mits the characteristics—low-down, symmetrical conformation—of
the lard type of market hog. Each farmer should select from these
breeds the one that, on the whole, best suits his particular condi-
tions, judging from his personal preference, his method of produc-
tion, the local popularity of the breed, and the market demands.
The most desirable market hogs are those of uniformity in breed
and type, combined with finish and quality. There is so little dif-
ference between the breeds, when properly handled, that the results
obtained will be due to the intelligence of the breeder rather than
to the merits of the breed itself.

Selection of Breeding Stock

Swine offer a greater opportunity for improvement and upgrad-
ing than any other class of live stock. There is no reason why any
farmer raising hogs should have a herd of scrubs and inferior indi-
viduals. Starting with a pure-bred sire and continuing to use a
sire of the same breed, but a few years are required to establish, at
little expense, a grade herd equal to pure breeds in every way for
pork production. No class of animals increases so rapidly and none
so readily retains the acquired characteristics. Even when start-

Deposit the sale of your cotton and other farm products with us,
and let us enter them on your passbook. Check it out as needed.
At the end of the year your passbook will show what every crop
made, and your checks will be a receipt for every dollar spent.

Page 51

Livia STOCISX

ing with an inferior lot of sows, a uniform herd can be developed
by using a good boar and each succeeding year rejecting all infe-
rior animals from the breeding herd.

A Good Boar is Essential

The most detrimental factor to swine breeding is the “scrub”
boar, for he has neither individuality, good breeding, nor any qual-
ity worth transmitting. The herd boar should be pure bred and
have individual merit and character. Pure breeding should insure
prepotency in the sire and give uniformity and character to his off-
spring. The breeder should become a competent judge and study
the type, shape, and conformation of his animals under different

ages and conditions.

Practical Swine Management

The sire should be strong in the characteristics of the breed and
possess the type of market class to which he belongs. While the
boar may well have the proper color markings and points of the
breed, it is all important that he should possess a combination of
size and quality. <A sire of the lard type should be short and broad
in the face, broad between the eyes, and have short, broad ears.
His neck should rise rapidly behind the ears and widen into a body
which is long, uniformly wide and deep. boars often become too
wide and rough in the shoulders, with deep wrinkles in the skin.
The thick plates of hard skin on the sides of the shoulders are
sometimes called “shields.” Mature boars are liable to develop
massive forequarters and be narrow behind, with insufficient depth -
in the hams and twist. Sires of this sort should be avoided. Seek
refinement in the head and forequarters, with a broad, strong,
slightly arched back, a wide loin, and wide, deep hams. It is 1m-
perative that the legs and feet of a boar be short, strong, and sound.
The tendency has been to pay particular attention to the hog’s
conformation of body and too little to his legs and feet. The legs
below the knees and hocks should be of medium size and free from
fleshiness or wrinkles in the skin.

Good bones have quality and proper shape. Size and coarseness
do not always indicate strength. The pastern of the hog should
be short and upright, giving strength and support to the limb above

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LIWi STOCK

and the foot below. After having selected the boar, with refer-
ence to his individuality and family characteristics, quarantine him
for at least three weeks before using for service. Parasites and dis-
ease are often introduced by newly purchased animals. During
the period of quarantine handle the boar and get him into proper
shape for service by proper feed and exercise. He may have the
run of a small grass paddock, and, if young, may be fed three times
a day; if mature, twice a day will suffice. When the boar is five
or six months old, he will do best if kept by himself, and should not
be used for service until seven and a half or eight months old. As
a general rule, it is inadvisable to allow a boar to serve more than
once a day, and he should not be used immediately after feeding.
Early in the morning is the best time to use him. The boar should
be treated two or three times a year with crude oil, as prescribed in
the treatment for lice, to keep his hair and skin in proper condition.
When over a year old, the feet often need trimming. The tusks
should be cut with a large nipper or pinchers twice a year, and not
knocked out with a cold chisel. The latter cruel practice often re-
sults in fracturing the jawbone and causes serious trouble.

A tried sire should be used as long as possible, for such an ani-
mal is the surest proposition and should not be disposed of before
a successor has been sufficiently tested.

Selection of the Brood Sow

The sire is often considered half the herd, but in reality the fe-
males are equally important. The typical sire will transmit his
qualities of excellence to his get, but the best results will only be
had when he is mated with proper.dams. The dams should have
the same combination of size and quality requisite in the sire. In
conformation she need not be so compactly built, and may be
somewhat finer in features and bone. The sow that is quiet and
docile in temperament proves a good mother and is careful with her
litter. These characteristics can, to some extent, be judged before
‘the sow has been used. The ideal sow has ten to twelve well-
developed, sound teats. Sows occasionally have “blind” teats
that are rarely detected before farrowing. “The number of sound
teats is sometimes considered an indication of prolificacy in the

sow. Prolificacy usually is a family characteristic, and it is wise

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LIVE STOCK

to select a prospective brood sow from a large litter of robust pigs.
The strongest pigs of a litter, most suitable for prospective sows,
usually nurse from the teats nearest to the front of the udder. The
prospective brood sow may, therefore, be chosen before she is taken
from her dam.

In selecting brood sows, the highest possible standard of excel-
lence should be retained, and all others should be marketed for pork.

A practice too common in the South is to raise hogs in the woods,
without any special care as to breeding or feeding, or else raise
them in a dry lot and feed nothing but corn. In the former case
the hogs make little growth and make an inferior animal that is
hard to sell at any price, while those raised in the dry lot are never
healthy or thrifty; and though they take on flesh, it is at a cost
that wipes out all profit. Hogs raised on corn alone, worth 70
cents a bushel, will cost the owner 10 cents a pound on foot when
ready for the market.

Hogs can be raised for 2 to 3 cents, but only when raised on pas-
tures supplemented by corn or by crops grown for them, as oats,
peas, and soy beans. Hogs are strictly a grazing animal, and
should always be provided with pastures of Bermuda and clovers
for summer and the winter-growing crops of oats, barley, or rye for
winter.

The small pigs should have a separate feeding pen or lot ar-
ranged so the larger hogs cannot get in. Hogs should be provided
with plenty of shade in the summer and dry sleeping quarters in
the winter and plenty of fresh water at all times, and should be
inoculated against hog cholera and have access to the following
mineral mixture:

Charcoali(bushtels) Ras eemee nen rere er 1y%
Salt(pound's)\ Akawiiwatie acces meee seta ee 4
Hardwood ashes (pounds) .................... 10
Silackedtlinales (pounds) aerate een 4

CLARENDON DAVIS.

Open a savings acvount, drawing four per cent interest, com-
pounded semiannually.

Page 54

Liwt STOCK

THE SOUTHERN CROPPING SYSTEM

R, I should say, the lack of any proper system. Farming in
@) the South is behind that of the North mainly because of
VS" the total lack of systematic farming and rotation, and no
improvement can ever be made so long as men parcel out their land
in little pieces for tenant croppers to grow cotton, without any idea
of farm development and soil improvement.

A real tenant system—a plan by which real farmers can take a
farm and, instead of running it down, build it up—has been devised
and put into successful practice for over thirty years in Eastern
Maryland. It is founded on the remark of the man who started it:
“1 do not want a man on a farm of mine who cannot make money
there for himself while making the farm better every year.” This
man started with the idea that farming, as a joint enterprise be-
tween owner and tenant, could be made profitable to both. He
bought a farm, with comfortable buildings and barns, and made a
contract with a farmer to take it and manage it on shares. The
landlord furnished the farm and buildings and kept them in repair.
He furnished the fencing material, and the tenant built the fences.
He furnished the paint and whitewash for the buildings, and the
tenant applied them. The tenant must have a reputation as an in-
telligent farmer and must own stock enough for the farm. He
must farm in a regular rotation as laid down in the contract, and
all the hay and fodder and straw belong to him so long as he feeds
them to his stock. He pays no rent for the stock except the ma-
nure. If aman has been on a farm five years and the farm shows
no improvement, he is apt to be moved; but so long as he farms
according to contract, he is certain to stay right there. This man
bought farm after farm from the rentals of the preceding ones, un-
til at the time of his death he had nearly 25,000 acres of land in
fifty-six farms, all fitted with dwellings of comfortable class and
with tenants making money, while the landlord was paying taxes
on a million dollars’ worth of real estate, all made at farming.
There are men living on these farms who have been there for over
thirty years, and some have handed down the farms to their sons,
who are farming on the same contract. Others have bought fine
farms for themselves and have a good bank balance, and the lands

Page 55

SEP 24 1918

LIiWwk STO Cik

of the estate have steadily improved. By this fair system other
men in Maryland have become millionaires, and the lands have been
improved; and there are men of standing and influence in their
county affairs who live on these rented farms and prefer it to own-
ing one. There is no better opportunity in the South for men of
means than the establishment of just such a system; but it means
fitting the farms with dwellings, and not cabins, and equipping them
so that men with means for farming can be induced to take them.

These millionaire landowners of Maryland are the plainest sort
of business men and perfectly accessible. ‘There is a story told of
Captain Andrew Woodall, who owned more than a million dollars’
worth of farms in Kent and Cecil Counties. He had an office on
the wharf at Georgetown. One day an exquisitely dressed young
man, with a shiny buggy, went there with the intention of renting
a farm. He saw a rather “ seedy-looking ” man on the porch, and
said: “ Will you hold my horse a while?” “Certainly,” said the
man; and he stepped down and took charge of the horse. The
young man went into the office and met the clerk and asked him
if Captain Woodall was in. “No,” said the clerk. “ When will
he be in?” “That depends on how long you keep him holding
your horse.” That fellow did not get a farm, for Captain Woodall
knew a farmer at sight.

Renting farms on a fixed contract with men able to farm and
giving the tenant a fair show has made more than one millionaire
in Maryland, and the same sensible system would make millionaires
and wealthy tenants all over the South. | knew a man who had
been prominent in his county, had been a State Senator, and had
means invested in various enterprises, who lived all his life on a
rented farm, and said that he could make more money than by
owning and farming it, while the investment in the farm gave the
millionaire owner a clear income of five per cent on his investment,
or better than government bonds. When a landowner gets in the
wheat crop alone over 100,000 bushels in rent, it is easy to see that
he can buy more farms. Wes MEANS SI

Associate Editor of Progressive Farmer.

STATEMENT OF THE CONDITION OF THE

HUNTSVILLE BANK AND TRUST CO.

HUNTSVILLE, ALABAMA

AT THE CLOSE OF BUSINESS, JANUARY 2, 1913

RESOURCES
Higame rand sdiSCOWUMES: 2 pny siege cones ee $546,919 78
MeO enciiaitscsrn cesta se sr reer aca 918 50
SOC SSAMCE OMG Suh Namek iy ccaiah winnie. 28,200.00
ME AIHEGhAte Ra ha Gn ON ee northstar cero ti > 15,750 00
MEHIEMre and fchuneSas.c.). os net awe tee 8,511 76
Woiestromesotier banks] ose at ct tele $130,825 91
CHTRETU CHE Aisi GiB a Cee ieee Re enon nae aera 21,049 00
REC Mp om TR Ide orig acuta ty Sst 7 A735 00
Silver, nickels, and pennies ............. 9.617 62
Cash items and exch’ge for clearing house 15,538 78— 184,506 31
pinial cerry eee ee Sey acns cere ee cuath cae! Y $784,806 35
LIABILITIES
Graurcanlistocle iS sary cami tele asks a tconet oe pte $150,000 00
Surplus and undivided profits ........... 61,322 99
finrdividialdeposits vie see ores ss en $477,930 47
@enitieates.Onndepositer a. a(n. Se ss 85,872 O1
WirestOLOrmenmbaMmkGey lyst es visrainc as 5,495 88
Wirpaldudividendsie cess sh sc ss. euien es 4185 00— 573,483 36
PU ieen DS cS a es SS a rac $784,806 35

8@- We solicit Accounts of Banks, Corporations, Firms, and Individuals. We are now
making a study of the needs of Farmers and in the future will give SPECIAL ATTEN-
TION to FARMERS’ ACCOUNTS: LET THIS BE YOUR BANK.

Cc. L. Nolen
W. I. Wellman
Lawrence Cooper
A. M. Booth

Clarendon Davis, President is
Lawrence Cooper, Vice Presiden

OFFICERS ss

4

E. T. Terry, Vice President

W. R. Hutton, Cashier

M. B. Merts, Assistant Cashier

DIRECTORS

E. T. Terry
Clarendon Davis
R. E. Smith

ie 6