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Show DRY FARMING IS NECESSITY Vast Area Cannot Be Irrigated and Must Remain Uninhabitable Unless Dry Farm Methods Used. (By 3 H. 'WORST, North Dakota Agricultural Agricul-tural College.) The fact that nearly half the earth's surface is visited with less than twenty twen-ty Inches of annual precipitation makes dry farming a necessity. But a fraction of this vast area is susceptible sus-ceptible of irrigation under any circumstances. cir-cumstances. What cannot be irrigated irri-gated must be cultivated by dry-farming dry-farming methods or remain uninhabitable uninhabit-able and practically useless, for human hu-man genius cannot remove natural barriers, such aB mountain ranges, which place a limit upon precipitation. precipita-tion. It can, however, suggest methods meth-ods of agriculture that may be adjusted ad-justed to local conditions; methods of tillage that will prevent the unnecessary un-necessary evaporation of soil moisture, mois-ture, together with the breeding of plantB, themselves economic of moisture. mois-ture. These factors taken together will tend to make agriculture not only successful, but profitable with less rainfall than in humid districts where, as a matter of fact, the total precipi tation during the year Is frequently far in excess of the needs of the growing crops. Moreover, excess of moisture Is likely to prove as destructive de-structive of crops as deficiency of moisture and far more injurious to the land. The fact must be admitted that the 6wamps and the sea receive a tremendous annual toll of plant food resulting from the "run-off' of humid countries. This loss of fertility, which is beyond estimate, must be made good by some means, so that between restoring lost fertility and Installing drainage systems, the humid countries are quite as severely vexed as the semi-arid countries. |