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Show Membership Gains Reported by Farm Cooperatives I Gains in both membership and ' volume of business by farmers' cooperative marketing and pur- chasing associations during the ! 1935-3 6 marketing season are re-! re-! ported in estimates released by the ; farm credit administration. B:s-i B:s-i ing its figures on information it j assembles yearly, the cooperative division reports that the Rocky Mountain region, dining the past season, had 4 60 cooperative associations as-sociations with an estimated membership mem-bership of close to 150.000 farmers farm-ers Total estimated business amounted to $SS. 160.000 or nearly 5 per cent of the nation's total. It is also revealed that dairy cooperatives transacted the greatest great-est amount of business cf any single commodity, the volume for! j the year amunting to $520,000-1 j 000 in the entire country. This is' ! 2S per cent cf the esim.ited busi-l busi-l ness which is given :s S1.S10.-flufl.ooo S1.S10.-flufl.ooo fcr the marketing pssci-i pssci-i aliens in the country. Crop insurance, in the opinion Cf Secietary at Agriculture Henrv A Wallace. c.Ters very gr.-at pos-!s:l)ilit:fs pos-!s:l)ilit:fs both for producers and consumers in the stabi'.zation of j supplies through a system which ! w?uld store food products in time cf plenty to be available in i tiir.j o.' want. i Secretary Wallace has pointed j out that crop insuriin.'c cannot serve as a complete subslitut? for other nie sures, but may prove to be one nioie aid to strengthen the general farm program. "We need a broad, coordinated attack in many piOhlems". he says. "Our permanent policy with respect to agricultuic must shape itsdf to give the farmer his fair sharf-r sharf-r f piospenty. having due r' mrd i: tin. ong-tim ? inurests of the national community as a whole The hog-cirn nrice ratio p:oi-abiv p:oi-abiv will not nntinti'-. throughout through-out 1937 at the low level now Tf vailing. With reduced slaughter slaught-er supplies after the heavy wintT I (Continued on page four) FARM NEWS (Continued from first page) run of hogs is over, hog prices are expected to advance rather sharply, whil-a corn prospects are favorable. By bleeding time for the 1937 fall pig crop, the hog-corn hog-corn price ratio may be again quite favorable both hog feeding feed-ing and for hog breeding. Under these conditions, a shaip increase in fall farrowings in 1937 will take place. A further increase in farrowings may be expected in 1935, provided another severe drought does not occur. Even with increased pig crops in 19 3 S and 1939, it is not expected that hog slaughter supplies win reach a volume comparable with the average for the 5 years from 1929 to 1933 prior to 1940 from "The Hog Situation", November 1936, Bureau of Agricultural Economics, Eco-nomics, U. S. D. A. Farming for Wildlife "... The status of wildlife as a crop, and a dependable one, will not, perhaps, gain immediate popular recognition in the American Ameri-can West, where 'game and fish are naturally plentiful", says an editorial in the Oregonian (Portland, (Port-land, Oregon), "although in nuin- j bers materially reduced since pio- I neer times. But in older states i public sympathy and cooperation j alieady are enlisted, and farmers, i for example, have been brought to realize that cover suited to quaii will encourage the multiplication ' of a not important economic re-: re-: source. This crop of game can I be. as often it is. realized up-.m j the renting of shooting privileges to sportsmen. Ponds may be i stocked with food fishes, to vary i the family larder or to afford sport. More than ever it is coming to be realized that a farm may conveniently, and to its financial advantage, raise game and fish as well as other staple crops . . . Carl Benson, a Silverton, Oregon farmer, studied the natural foods of game birds, with the intent to provide those for the birds in unutilized nooks or waste areas. It is Mr. Benson's firm belief that if this were generally gen-erally done there would soon be marked increase in game birds an opinion, by the way, amply supported by the research and experiments of the Biological Survey. Sur-vey. Of course, we will never restore the old rail fences of an earlier era, but, as Mr. Benson has pointed out, it is significant to remember that in the times when rail fences v."C ;he I rather than exception, game birds I were very numerous. Shrubs and weeds found a haven along tne j fences, creating conditions admirable admir-able for game birds by affording shelter and food. Restoration of such conditions could be accomplished accom-plished very simply, without splitting split-ting rails." l S. D. A.'s "Daily Digest". |