Oklahoma Farmer (Guthrie, Okla.), Vol. 15, No. 24, Ed. 1 Wednesday, October 10, 1906 Page: 1 of 16
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1III2 o;v*o l K farm paper op oklahoma and iivjo. ter.
VOL. XV, No. 24
GUTHRIE, OKLA., WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 10, 1906.
50 Cents a Year.
£******±******************1 ti********************.,. t*lH.
J Dry Farming—What it Means
and What it Accomplishes
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Woodward Bulletin.
Nearly one-third of the entire area
of the United tSates, exclusive of
Alaska and our Insular possessions,
consists of vacant public lands re-
garded as naturally unsuited to culti-
vation on account of insufficient rain-
fall.
In at least ten Western common-
wealths the public lands constitute so
large a portion of the total area as to
dominate their economic character.
Great belts of the territory are fre-
quently in condition closely bordering
on anarchy. Cattle-owners and sheep
owners struggle for possession of lands
belonging to neither. Forests are
burned and looted. Legislators, gov-
ernors, judges and minor public offic-
ials are elected and corrupted at the
dictation of the cattle kings, and laws
are passed, repealed, enforced or dis-
regarded to suit their interests. Leg-
itimate settlers are discouraged, driv-
en eft, or bought out for a song. Agri-
culture is confined almost to small and
scattered bits of irrigated land.
However, the vacant pupllc lands
comprise only a part -,r the region of
deficient rainfall known as Arid Am-
erica. To these must be added the
great railroad grants, the allotments
of schcol lands to the several states,
and the princely domains that have
passed into the hands if private own-
ers. In Texas alone there Is an area
of unimproved and uncultivated land
almost equal in extent tci the German
empire. With the exception of Wash-
ington, western Oregon, the northern-
half of California and small portions
of Idaho and Mcintana. the term Arid
America includes virtually all the land
^between the one hundredth meridian
"and the Pacific, leaving out of consid-
eration the portions that extend across
the Canadion and Mexican boundary
lines, It covers a territory extending
north and south for a distance ot
1,200 miles and east and west for 1,300
miles, embracing four-tenths of the
total area of the republic, and con-
taining nat less than one thousand
million acres of land. To this may
not Improperly be added the so-called
subhumld region, between the ninety-
seventh and one hundredth meridians,
In which occasional seasons of suffi-
cient or even superabundant rainfall
are followed by years of drought, when
scorching winds shrivel up the grow-
ing grains and grasses upon which
depends the hopes of the farmers.
Ovei* almost exactly one-half the area
of our country, the efore, the rainfall
is insufficient for the successful cul-
tivation of the ordinary crop plants—
by ordinary farming methods, at least
Agriculture, wherever attempted at all,
partakes of the nature of a hazardous
speculation, generally resulting In dis-
aster, or at best In a maagar haud-to
month existence; and grazing, backed
up by ample capital and resources, Is
considered the only sate ana profitable
pursuit. This vast area In which
grazing is the principal industry, ex-
tends over all or part of seventeen
states and territories. In ten of these
no more than 2 per cent of the land is
under cultivation averages less than
three to the square mile.
On the grazing lands from twenty to
thirty acres of pasturage are required
for the support of a single cow. Wher-
ever irrigation is practicable the same
amount of land, watered and planted
with alfalfa, will support ten times as
many cattle. But wherever the same
lunds can be planted in fruit trees
tains, and most c>f die inter-mountain
parks and plateaus between the Rock-
ies and the Pacific, will produce as
abundantly as will the rich pririe
lands of Iowa, Missouri and Illinois,
and much more aoundantly than the
richest of the lands in and of the older
states along the Atlantic seboard; that
enough land now utilized, if at all,
only for grazing to make possible the
trebling c.r quadrupling of the present
farming population of the Unites
States.
Probably there is no exaggeration in
the statement made by one writer that
the region between the foot-hills ot
the Rocky mountains, bounded on the
south by the Rio Grande and on the
north by the Canadian border, is cap-
able of producing fruits, cereals, vege-
tables and live stock sufficient for the
support of the entire present popula-
tion of the globe. This vast area of
fertile and as yet almost untilized lan 1,
is the foundation upon which the Am-
erican people must build for the con-
BT1CERB FATTENED ON BrBLTT AND COItN.
cereals and vegetables, each farm of
forty acres will support a family of
from three to^five persons. That ir-
■rigaton alone can never furnish
eatisfactory solution of the problen.
presented by the arid and sem-arij
lands of the Wect is proved by the
fact that were every ir.ch <±t the annual
rainfall west of the one hi.idreJth
meridian conserved in stroage reser-
voirs and distributed at the best pos-
sible advantage, an area equal to one-
fifth of the total land surface of the®
country would remain unsupplied.
Contrary to commony accepted ideas
as the statement may be. it i^, never-
theless, an amply ciemon. truteJ fact®
that wherever in this great arid em-
pire the annual uinfall averages as
high as twelve inches ,a« good crops
can be raised witiout irrigation as
with It. This means tl.at almost evtry
acre of the great plaluj between the
Missouri rlvar and tna R.icicy rnoun-
tinuance of their prosperity for at
least a century to come. Properly util-
ized it may solve many perplexing
problems. It will relieve the conges-
tion of the cities, provide an outlet
for superabundant capital ,and afford
opportunittles for the enterprising and
discontented fc,r decades. It contains
the richest mineral deposits the great-
est forest resources, the most fertile
soil, and the most genial and salub-
cious climate on this continent. What
its development and exploitation would
mean to the transportation, manufac-
turing, mercantile, financial and la-
bor interests of the nation cannot be
even dimly foreshadowed. It would
furnish a stimulus that would be fell
not merely in the gerat centers of po-
pulation and industry, but in the re-
motest hamlet and c« the most isolated
farm in the republic.
The United States dapartment of
agriculture, the governments of the
various states in which vacant public
lands are located, and the great trans-
continental railroads owning land
grants, have awakened to a realization
of the importance of "dry farminsr,"
or scientific soil culture, which men is
more to the people of the United
States than do all the ~ostly irrigation
projects now under'^^y or projected
for the future.
It has been demonstrated on half a
score of experiment statlcais on as
many more molel firms maintained
by Western railroads, and on hundreds
of private farms, that it is necessary
on the plains and in the lntermountain
parks and valleys is intelligently to
make the most of the rains and snow*
that fall in order to grow as good
crops as can *e raised anywhere. In
Cither woyds, farming methods must be
adapted to natural conditions. This
the only wonder is that men have been
so very slow in finding it out. It ought
not to be hard to believe that lands
that produce the rich buffalo and gra-
ma grasses of the plains without cul-
tivation can be made to produce crops
still more valuable with cultivation
adapted to the soil and climate. Car-
rying the same argument a little fur-
ther there are many who believe thit
wherever sage-brush, cactus-plants,
yucca, Spanish bayonet and grease-
wood will grow, plants of economic
value may be made to grow, also.
What western people have become
accustomed to calling the "Campbell
system of dry farming" consists sim-
ply in the exercise of intelligence,
care, patience and tireless industry.
It differs frcm the "good farming"
methods practised and taught at the
various agricultural experiment sta-
tions; but the underlying principles
are the same.
cwpuhb.fid.osca s8IS8wc m.n fmfmff
These principles are two in number.
First, to keep the surface of the land
under cultivation loose and finely pul-
verized. This forms a soil mulch that
permits the rains and melting snows
to percolate, readily "through to the
compacted soli beneath; and that at
the same time prevents the moisture
stored in the ground frcm being
brought to the surface by capillary at-
traction, to be absorbed by the hot,
dry air. The second is toi keep the
sub-soil finely pulverized and firmly
compacted, increasing its water-hold-
ing capactiy and its capillary attrac-
tion, and placing it in the best possible
physical condition for the germination
cif seed and the development of plant
roots. The "dry farmer" thus stores
wj&ter not in dams and reservoirs, but
right where it can be reached by the
roots of growing crops.
Through these principles, a rainfall
of twelve inches can be conserved so
effectively that It will produce crops
reasonably expected of an annual pre-
cipitation of twenty-four inches in
humid America. The discoverer and
demonstrator of these principles de-
serves to rank among the greatest of
national benefactors.
It has been thoroughly demonstrat
(Continued on page it)
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Greer, Frank H. Oklahoma Farmer (Guthrie, Okla.), Vol. 15, No. 24, Ed. 1 Wednesday, October 10, 1906, newspaper, October 10, 1906; Guthrie, Oklahoma. (https://gateway.okhistory.org/ark:/67531/metadc88122/m1/1/: accessed April 24, 2024), The Gateway to Oklahoma History, https://gateway.okhistory.org; crediting Oklahoma Historical Society.