“I saw at Rome, N.Y., these two leading branches of New York farming united on the Huntington tract of 1,300 acres. Three or four farms (I forget which) had separate and distinct management, conducted by different families, but each had a dairy combined with the raising of large crops of grain, such as wheat, corn, oats, etc. These grain-crops, with suitable areas of meadow and pasture, sustained the dairy, and the cows converted much of the grain, and all of the forage, into manure. Thus was combined, to mutual advantage, these two important branches of New York farming. Wheat and cheese to sell, and constant improvement in crops.
“In our own case, sheep have been combined with grain-raising. So we have sold wool, wheat, and barley, and, in all my life, not five tons of hay. Clover, you know, has been our great forage-crop. We have wintered our sheep mostly on clover-hay, having some timothy mixed with it, that was necessarily cut (to make into hay with the medium, or early clover,) when it was but grass. We have fed such hay to our cows and horses, and have usually worked into manure the corn-stalks of about 20 acres of good corn, each winter, and we have worked all the straw into shape to apply as manure that we could, spreading it thickly on pastures and such other fields as were convenient. Some straw we have sold, mostly to paper-makers.”
“That,” said the Deacon, “is good, old-fashioned farming. Plenty of straw for bedding, and good clover and timothy-hay for feed, with wool, wheat, and barley to sell. No talk about oil-cake, malt-combs, and mangels; nothing about superphosphate, guano, or swamp-muck.”
Mr. Geddes and Mr. Johnston are both representative farmers; both are large wheat-growers; both keep their land clean and thoroughly cultivated; both use gypsum freely; both raise large crops of clover and timothy; both keep sheep, and yet they represent two entirely different systems of farming. One is the great advocate of clover; the other is the great advocate of manure.
I once wrote to Mr. Geddes, asking his opinion as to the best time to plow under clover for wheat. He replied as follows:
“Plow under the clover when it is at full growth. But your question can much better be answered at the end of a long, free talk, which can best be had here. I have many times asked you to come here, not to see fine farming, for we have none to show, but to see land that has been used to test the effects of clover for nearly 70 years. On the ground, I could talk to a willing auditor long, if not wisely. I am getting tired of being misunderstood, and of having my statements doubted when I talk about clover as the great renovator of land. You preach agricultural truth, and the facts you would gather in this neighborhood are worth your knowing, and worth giving to the world. So come here and gather some facts about clover. All that I shall try to prove to you is, that the fact that clover and plaster are by far the cheapest manures that can be had for our lands, has been demonstrated by many farmers beyond a doubt—so much cheaper than barn-yard manure that the mere loading of and spreading costs more than the plaster and clover. Do not quote me as saying this, but come and see the farms hereabouts, and talk with our farmers.”
Of course I went, and had a capital time. Mr. Geddes has a magnificent farm of about 400 acres, some four miles from Syracuse. It is in high condition, and is continually improving, and this is due to growing large and frequent crops of clover, and to good, deep plowing, and clean and thorough culture.
We drove round among the farmers. “Here is a man,” said Mr. G., “who run in debt $45 per acre for his farm. He has educated his family, paid off his debt, and reports his net profits at from $2,000 to $2,500 a year on a farm of 90 acres; and this is due to clover. You see he is building a new barn, and that does not look as though his land was running down under the system.” The next farmer we came to was also putting up a new barn, and another farmer was enlarging an old one. “Now, these farmers have never paid a dollar for manure of any kind except plaster, and their lands certainly do not deteriorate.”