This article was written in the first decade of the 20th
century. It was about real farming experiences in Hickman
County. This was during the advent of "scientific
farming," and it was well before mechanized agriculture
(tractors).
A Few Farming Experiments
Some years ago we had some old pasture that we wished to
sow in bermudagrass. Some of our older neighbors advised us
to get the sod, but the seed house catalogs said we could
get a stand from the seed. As we did not know where to get
the sod, we thought we would take the advise of the seeds
man. We bought seed at a very high price, fixed a good
seedbed, sowed our seed, and had just as well to have sown
the money.
Another time we were in need of a disc harrow. We wanted a
large one. The old one we had just sold had 10, 16 inch
discs. We wanted at least 12, 20 inch discs. After looking
around a little, we decided to buy one that threw the dirt
all one way. That cost about $45. It was a great heavy
affair, weighed 900 pounds, and was so large it would not go
through our gates. We had to tear down our fence every time
we moved it from one field to another. It did work work well
in ground that was loose, but if a little hard, it did no
good. We found we needed a smaller one.
Another time we were planting corn and an agent drove up
and sold us a grain grader $5.00 and dinner for two men and
two horses. He offered a silver dollar for every grain of
cockel that could be found after he had run a sample of wheat
through the grader. No one else can manage it so well and he
sold several of them around here. Though the grader is a very
good one, we could have bought as good one for less
money.
Last fall we decided to try some crimson clover in a piece
of corn. The advice was to sow the latter part of August, 15
lbs. to the acre. We thought that some too much seed and put
1 1/4 bu. on eight acres. On 4 acres we got no stand. On the
other 4, we got a fairly good stand in spots. We read that it
would do better this year on the same land if sown again. On
the piece where we had a thin stand, we sowed a bushel this
fall, the latter part of August, and from the looks of it
now, it is a failure. The first cost $5.46, and this year
$8.87. That's a total of $14.33 trying the other
fellow's tricks. Though I believe the
clover would be all right if we could run a plow through our
corn just before it was sowed.
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