S. Lewis & Son,
Pt. Pleasant, W. Va. 51

Alfalfa on the Ohio State University Farm 61

Curing Alfalfa at the Pennsylvania
Experiment Station 68

A Heavy Grass Sod in New York 73

Good Pasture Land in Chester County, Pa. 90

Sheep on a New York Farm 96

The Cowpea Seeded at the Last Cultivation of Corn
in the Great Kanawha Valley, W. Va. 106

Texas Calves on an Ohio Farm 121

In the Fertile Miami Valley, Ohio 126

Concrete Stable Floors 131

Corn in the Ohio Valley 140

Penn's Valley, Pennsylvania 151

In the Shenandoah Valley 155

Plat Experiments 167

In the Lebanon Valley, Pennsylvania 189

On the Productive Farm of Dr. W. I. Chamberlain
in Northwestern Ohio 210

Deep Tillage 222

Making an Earth Mulch in a New York Orchard 233

Drain Tile 239

The Lure of the Country 246

CROPS AND METHODS FOR SOIL IMPROVEMENT

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

In Lieu of Preface.--This book is not a technical treatise and is
designed only to point out the plain, every-day facts in the natural
scheme of making and keeping soils productive. It is concerned with the
crops, methods, and fertilizers that favor the soil. The viewpoint, all
the time, is that of the practical man who wants cash compensation for
the intelligent care he gives to his land. The farming that leads into
debt, and not in the opposite direction, is poor farming, no matter how
well the soil may prosper under such treatment. The maintenance and
increase of soil fertility go hand in hand with permanent income for
the owner when the science that relates to farming is rightly used.
Experiment stations and practical farmers have developed a dependable
science within recent years, and there is no jarring of observed facts
when we get hold of the simple philosophy of it all.

Natural Strength of Land.--Nearly all profitable farming in this
country is based upon the fundamental fact that our lands are
storehouses of fertility, and that this reserv