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Show SUMMER FALLOW PAYS Known to Be Absolute Necessity to Profitable Wheat Farming. When Properly Prepared and Csred for Enables Farmer to Store In Soil Large Amount of Moisture Mois-ture for On Crop. (My PROF. W. M. JARDINK. A Krone mint, Kansas Btat Agricultural Col- lege.) In Utah, Idaho, Oregon and Washington Wash-ington and parts of Montana, districts of very low rainfall, usually less than 15 Inches annually, 75 per cent, of ! which falls during lute autumn, winter 1 and early spring months, and a large per cent, of which Is snow, the Importance Impor-tance of the summer fallow Is no longer debatable. It Is known to be an absolute necessity to profitable j wheat farming, and undoubtedly will i continue to be as long as wheat growing grow-ing remains the basic dry farm crop, or until drought-reBlstant and early-maturing strains of lnter-tllled crops, such as corn, alfalfa, Canada peas, Mexican beans, potatoes, sorghums, etc., can be discovered or developed to take the place of the fallow. The great concern of every farmer operating In the extreme western counties coun-ties of Kansas Is moisture. In years of abundance of rainfall, crops are usually good, no matter what system has been followed. Profitable crops are produced in such years, even when wheat has been stubblcd in after wheat, but In dry years such a practice results In failure, and the country Is condemned because It Is too dry to produce crops, when In reality the fault In not with the country, but with tho man. It has been thoroughly demonstrated through experiment that the summer fallow, when properly prepared aud cared for, enables the farmer to store In his soil a large amount of the moisture mois-ture of two years' precipitation for the production of one crop; ;and through Its use profitable crops can usually be grown, even In years of the most extreme ex-treme drought. Though the summer fallow fal-low enables the farmer to produce bigger big-ger yields during favorable years than Is possible by any other system of farming Its real merits are only brought out In dry ye-ars. Summer fallow or summer tillage rom-lst in plowing the lands thoroughly thorough-ly to a good depth, seven inches or even deeper, either In the fall or in the spring, as weather conditions, soil I nioMure conditions and the disposition ! of th"farmer"s time will permit, and leaving It lie over during the summer la a cultivated condition and free from vegetation of any kind until planting ilmo. , Thi deep plowing facilitates the Storing of summer rains and the surface sur-face cultivation checks Its evaporation from tho soil until it can be utilized by tho growing crop. Weeds, volunteer grain or any form of vegetation muBt not be allowed to grow on the fallow, because they drink from the land as much moisture as a crop of wheat. Farming In tho extremo western counties of Kansas 1 very exacting if profitable crops are produced. The country is all right if the natural ad- 1 vantages are intelligently utilized. In a very large measure tho farmer can control these by proper methods of farming, and the summer fullow be- 1 longs lu this category because It la the 1 best known way of utilizing the scanty 1 supply of precipitation. 1 There Is one pnrslblo way In which 1 farmers operating under a low annual I precipitation can produce profitable I crops of wheat every other year with- out the uso of the fallow, and that is 1 by the substitution of Intrr-tllled crop.4 for the failow. P.y the growing of such crops as corn, sorghums, potatoes. Can- 1 ada peas, Mexican beans, etc., the land j can often be made to produeo profitable profita-ble tilled crops and at the same time put the toll in fair condition for wheat. The main drawback to such a system at this time lies In the fact that most pf the lnter-tllled crops now available are not very drought-resistant and are late maturing too into for the thort growing season common to the seml-arld seml-arld lands. I'Mially, too, such crops f cannot be removed from the land In time to plant winter wheat at the 1 proper time. In order to insure profit by utlllza- Hon of inter tilled crops in rotation with wheat. It will be necessary to dls- t cover or develop more hardy, drought-retistant. drought-retistant. early -matui ing varieties. Spe- r cial efforts are being directed along these lines by practically every scien- t title Investigator dialing wlih plants and operating within til" serularld dls- a tricts of the west. I'm 11 such discoveries discov-eries are made and their prncilonbility 1 demonstrated farmers would do well in western Kansas to sun nier fallow or K minimcr till tin Ir land at b ust ence In three years. There would be ab;o- b lutely no doubt. If such a system were ' practiced, that more farmers would be producing larger quantities of grain n from one h.ilf their land each year than ' they are now producing from their u' ole ffrm. c |