Three Acres and Liberty Part 7

Of course, the box has to be watched and taken in if it turns cold, but it's astonis.h.i.+ng how much can be raised and how much more can be learned out of season by the school desk boxes and the home window sliding boxes.

Try it and see for yourself.

The children can learn as much about some things from a box 2X1 ft.

as they can from a children's garden. Here are a couple of samples of what the kids themselves in a city school think of it.

"DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION

_"Office of the Princ.i.p.al of Public School No. 7_

"VAN ALST AVE., ASTORIA, QUEENS

"I inclose a few compositions that were written by some of our boys and girls of the Fourth Year. You will recognize the descriptions of your Garden Trays for cla.s.sroom use Unfortunately the free s.p.a.ce in the cla.s.sroom is limited, so we have found it necessary to allow each pupil only part of a box.

"The children themselves are delighted, as you can see by their compositions.

"Very sincerely yours, (Signed)"

AGNES A. CORDING

"a.s.st. Princ.i.p.al."

P. S. No. 7

Grade 4 A--April 2l, 1915.

Arthur Miller, Age 10

OUR GARDEN

At first we planted radishes then onions and lettuce and beans and sunflowers. Each one of us have 1/4 of a box. When we had finished that we brought them up to the front of the room and then watered them and went home.

Anna Duerr, Age 8

MY GARDEN

I have a garden. It is a box. I have a quarter of a box for my very own. My garden has five rows. In the first there are radishes, in the second lettuce, in the third onions, in the fourth beans, in the fifth sunflowers. I hope my garden grows up.

Of course these are only preparatory for profitable work. We have cases in which $2000 has been recorded from sales in one year from one acre, and many cases in which at least $1000 worth of produce has been sold from an acre. These are sales, not profits.

Such results are not due to the boundless and fertile soil of the new world nor to small farming alone--they are due to intelligence.

Professor Ronna gives the following figures of crops per acre at Romford (Breton's Farm): 28 tons of potatoes (say 952 bushels), 16 tons of marigold, 105 tons of beets, 110 tons of carrots, 9 to 20 tons of various cabbages, and so on.

It was suggested to the Agricultural Department that it might fix standards of what is a good attainable crop.

On every golf links we have what is called a Bogie score posted up.

That is a score that a certain mythical Captain Bogie, supposed to be an average good player, could make on those links. On one typical club-course, for instance, the Bogie score is 42. Though it has been done in 37, the ordinary player congratulates himself when he gets down to the Bogie score.

Now, if there were standards attainable to ordinary intelligent and good cultivation set in each section, it would enormously encourage farmers to reach them, which may be of great importance.

One of the heads of the Department replied as follows:

'"In regard to fixing a standard for each farmer to strive to attain, I think that a very good idea; but the standard for each crop in each particular locality would necessarily be somewhat different from that in every other locality. Persons who have had experience in experimental work keenly appreciate these points. The work which is done upon one soil formation under different climatic conditions in one season, does not necessarily find a duplicate in any other locality, and the experience is that what is accomplished in one year would not be duplicated on the same soil and under the same management again in several years, for the conditions under which agriculture is carried on are so many of them outside of the control of the operator that it is very difficult to predict results or to attain any fixed standard. This is necessarily so with an operation which has so many uncertain factors to deal with as agriculture. Humidity of the atmosphere and of the soil, the available plant food in the soil, methods of tillage, fertilizers used, recurrence of frosts, amount of sunlight, the alt.i.tude and lat.i.tude of different localities, all have a bearing upon crop production. It is, therefore, very difficult to fix any approximate standard or average production for any particular locality without basing it upon a long series of years. I think, however, that it is a subject worthy of agitation, and it might inspire agriculturists to better work were such an ideal fixed upon."

This indicates that each experiment station or progressive farmer or teacher of agriculture might advantageously establish the local "Bogie score" of what might fairly be expected.

We know how misleading averages are. The man who tried to wade across a stream whose average depth was two feet, was drowned. "The writer used to go to a fis.h.i.+ng club of which Cornelius Vanderbilt was a member. One of the standard jokes there was that the thirty members are worth on an average over two million apiece, that is, Cornelius sixty millions, and the rest of us (comparatively) nothing. Which are you to be? A Vanderbilt among cultivators, or the other fellow who makes the 'average'?" ("Money Making in Free America," by the Author.)

But even making all allowances we see that we must cultivate much better than the "average," to make anything more than the farmer's hard living off the land. Peter Dunne tells us what kind of a grind that is.

"This pa-aper says th' farmer niver sthrikes. He hasn't got th' time to. He's too happy. A farmer is continted with his farm lot. There's nawthin' to take his mind off his wurruk. He sleeps at night with his nose against th' s.h.i.+ngled roof iv his little frame home an'

dhreams iv cinch bugs. While th' stars are still alight he walks in his sleep to wake th' cows that left th' call f'r four o'clock. Thin it's ho! f'r feedin' th' pigs an' mendin' th' reaper. Th' sun arises as usual in th' east, an' bein' a keen student iv nature he picks a cabbage leaf to put in his hat. Breakfast follows, a gay meal beginnin' at nine an' endin' at nine-three. Thin it's off f'r th'

fields where all day he sets on a bicycle seat an' reaps the bearded grain an' th' Hessian fly, with nawthin' but his own thoughts an' a couple iv horses to commune with. An' so he goes an' he's happy th'

livelong day if ye don't get in ear-shot iv him. In winter he is employed keeping th' cattle fr'm sufferin' his own fate an' writin'

testymonyals iv dyspepsia cures." ("Mr. Dooley Says.")

CHAPTER VI

WHAT AN ACRE MAY PRODUCE

We have shown what an acre has produced. You must figure out for yourself what you can make your acres produce and what the product can be sold for.

All progress in agriculture has come heretofore through experiments, made mostly by uninformed and untrained men. What may not be done by practical learning and applied intelligence?

The wonderful recent advances have been made in just that way.

"The modern improved methods in agriculture, known collectively as intensive farming, have nearly all had their origin in the hands of truck farmers and market gardeners. No cla.s.s of the rural population is more alert in utilizing the newest researches and discoveries in all lines of agricultural science, and none keeps in closer touch with the agricultural colleges and experiment stations."

("Development of the Trucking Interests," by F. S. Earle.)

Still, it is not advisable for the ordinary city dweller, however intelligent, without other means and without either experience or study, to cast himself upon a small patch of ground for a living; but if he can give it most of his time mornings and evenings, or if he sees, as many do, that he will be forced out of a position, it would be well for him seriously to consider intensive cultivation as a resource.

It would be the greatest blessing to our day laborers if they could secure an acre of land which they could till in conjunction with their other labor. If time and change 90 works upon society as to put the laborer out of a job, he will be safe in his acre home and can live from it and be happy and contented.

The time required to cultivate an acre is much less than is generally supposed.

The maximum time required seems to be that given in the University of Illinois Experiment Station at Urbana, Bulletin 61, by J. W.

Lloyd, at the rate of 140 hours (say 14 days) with one horse and 250 hours (say 25 days) for hand labor. With a great variety of crops, or with poor labor add one half to this time allowance. The results vary greatly.

An acre of northeastern Long Island will produce 250 to 400 bushels of potatoes at a selling price of fifty to seventy five cents per bushel, which wholesale, at those figures much below present prices, bring an income of $125 to $300 to the grower. The actual cash outlay in one instance was: