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CUKRfcNi lS ON AGRICULTURE Edited by E. E. HALL, County Agt. JUST A SUGGESTION FOR THIS YEAR’S PLANNING •hr * because a cr*p was profitable last year, it does not follow that it will be profitable this year. II one • l your main crops paid you a bit better t! 'in anything else last year, it will probably be wise for you to f row that crop again this year, but it may not be wise for you to increa e the acreage of it or to give it u larger l place in your farming program. This Is especially true if that same crop was generally a paying crop last year. In that case, there may be a great many other farmers ready to go into it this year on a larger scale, and if that happens, profits from it jrre not likely again to be so good. This applies to the different classes of livestock kept on the farm as well’ as to the different crops grown on it. Of course, this is not offered as an infallible rule —there are not ma ny such rules in farming; but it is given as a suggestion to which heed may well he paid. The tendency to rush into a thing one year just be cause it paid well the yer before is a tendency to which most of us are too subject. Before the rushing be gins, it is well to figure out just as well as one can why the profit came and whether the conditions that made that particular part of the farm work stand out are likely to prevail the coming season. Unforeseen changes in conditions may, of course, make such study of little avail, hut it will he helpful more often than it will be useless. —Southern Agriculturist. SOY CLEANS VS. COW PEAS FOR HAY AND SOIL BUILDING • When suitable varieties are used, the soy bean in a much hotter hay crop than cowpea*. ft makes more hay, it is earsier cured, and if cut when just out of bloom ordinarily makes a better hay than cowpeas. Tlie mammoth Yellow is the standard variety. It seems tw do well all over the South except high in the moun tains, and it makes good yields and is of fair quality. Some newer varieties promise to be bettor than Mammoth Yellow, although it is not yet well known whether these other varieties hove as wide range af adaptibility'. The Tokio is a promising variety that makes finer hay and more of it than Mammoth Yellow when conditions are favorable. The Laredo is attract ing a great deal of interest now and seems to be a valuable variety. As to the comparative value of soy beans and cowpeas as soil im provers, neither of these crops is a soil improver if they are grown for hay and the crops are harvested and sold off of the farm. If soy beans or cowpeas are to be used to im prove the land, they must be past ured oil or harvested or fed to stock in the barn and the manure returned to the field that grew the crop. When either of the above methods is used 1 would expect the improvement of the soil to be proportional to the ton nage of the crop grown, provided that both crops were equally well in oculated . Soy beans are not ns well inoculated as we once supposed they were when grown on land the first time. This is especially true of other varieties than Mammouth Yellow. This variety seems to be inoculated fairly well the first time grown en land. With many varieties, at least, it will he advisable to inocnla-te the land or the seed the first time they are planted on the land. This one fact is probably largely responsible for the poor reputation the soy bean has as a soil improver. Vnother rea son that crops do not do so well af ter it as after cowpeas is that the Mammoth Yellow, which >s the vari ety usually grown. is a late vigorous grower and it uses up the soil mois ture more closely, as well as the a vailable mineeahle plant food in the soil. The wheat that follows can not grow off well unless the soil is uaus nallr good or moisture more than coninionly abundant. For tUsae rca s>'-u, and possibly from others not wall known, wheat or other fall crops will will do better after cowpeas than after soy beans. Southern Agriculturalist. FARM organizations in ACTION AT WASHINGTON Not content to wait while the spe cial committee is amassing and di gesting this enormous mass of ma terial the various farm organizations ji'ivc made a concerted move on con gress, looking to the enactment of measures that have been long to the fore at tie Capitol. Here are some uf the outstanding mearures to be urged: 1 . The McNe.ry-Haugen bill pro viding for the formation of a feder al export corporation to handle ex portable surplus of farm products. 2. Legislation assuring the far mers the continued development of Muscle Shoals and fertilizer at ft fair price. Because of the many btlli and bids pending befora the h(>nse and tto withdrawal of the Ford bid, it is probable that a joint com mittee of the twi? houses will be formed to agTee on a method of op erating the plant. 2. The Capper-Williams bill, pro viding <Yr a federal system for coop erative marketing of farm products. It would create a marketing board outside any government department or bureau and set up cooperative commodity boards bhruout the coun try. The Capper-French truth-in-fab rics bill which a special committee of the house was instructed t have ready for congress in December. 5. A measure providing increased appropriations for state agricultural experiment stations. 6. The McNary-Vestal bill stand ardizing cantainors for fruits and vegetables. 7. The Keteham bill, to lodge the foreign marketing of farm products and all work therewith connected, in the department of agriculture. It is to be understood, of course, that the special committee may ren der some of these measures unnec essary . CROP ESTIMATES FOR 1924 According to the estimates made for the annual report of the depart ment of agriculture which is about to be made public, the gross income from agricultural products for this year will be around $12,000,000,000 as compared with $11,500,000,000 in 1928-34 and $9,550,000,000 in 1921- 22. The point is made in the report that the year's harvest was the best in five years and altho not greatest in point of volume it was the finest from an income standpoint. “The showing of 1924,” says the report, “brings agricultural prosper ity nearer, altho the improvement it represents has not yet lasted long e nough to produce any marked better ment in the finances of the farmer.” What Does Twelve Billion Mean? “Twelve billion dollars” sounds very very big. If only for tins reas on the department of agriculture per formed a good service in interpreting this gross in terms of dividends to the farmers on the capital invested in his land . It means only 8.8 per cent on the investment, which fig ured in terms of percentages is much less than the returns on Class One railroads for the same period. Here is the interpretation of the depart ment of agriculture. It is also a sig n ifiant commentary. “Income from agriculture has not in any year since the price declined in 1920 sufficed to allow both a com mercial return on capital and ade quate rewards for the farmers' labor, risk and management. Yet it has jhown a gradual improvement in the last three years. In 1920, after deducting operating cost and a wage allowance for the farmer's labor, and ' efore payiag interest on debts, the net income on the curnent values of agricultural capital was only 0.6 per cent. It increased to 1.4 per cent in 1921. It made a further gain to 3.1 percent in 1922 and 1923. The indi cated further improvement to nearly percent f<w the present crop year does represent a very substancial ad vance from the low point of the de pression period. These returns, how ever, are made on a capital valuation that has been scaled down. Thus the real gain is not as large as the ap parant gain. ” IKE OANIELSVILLfi MONITOR. UANIELSVILLE. G*. BEAR WITH YOVR. PFU-OWMtd-j ETVEM lf= -YOU A.VL-E A J Road Tax Notice 1925 r I Georgia Madison County Commissoners Office January It). 1925. George 0. Griffeth Commissioner, Sitting for coun ty purposes, at this time proceeded to fix the number of days of Road Work for the county, the present year, and the Alternative in money, as follows: Time of Work Eight Days Money Alternative Four Dollar But to all who pay before the first day of June, Three and One Half Dollars will be excepted as pay ment in full and receipt will be given in full. Age Date October first is the date fixed, All who are fifty years old before the first day of October are exempt. All who are twenty one years old on the first day of October are subject. Owing to the condition of the roads arrangement can be made with the Commissioner to work outßoad Ex emption if the work is done at the earliest convenience, The Commissioner in person or by proxy will between the first and fifteenth days of October goto one or more places in each militia district in the County for the pur pose of receiving road exemptions and giving receipts therefor, from all who have not previously obtained a receipt and desire to be exempted from the Eight Days Work. The Eight Days Road Work under the authority ot the Commissioner will begin in each district in the county about the fifteenth day of October. Previous to that date all payments made for Road Work exemption must be make at Commissioners office. Solvent Checks, Post Office Orders, and Currency may be sent through the mails and receipts will be mailed at once, If the mail is used, a slip should be sent therewith giving the name for whom the pay is sent, the district, his age and color, If check or P. 0, order is sent it had best be made payable to G. O. Griff eth, Com,, but it had best be mailed to S. C, O’Kelley, Clerk Geo. O. Griffeth, Com. R. &. R. Madison County Guaranteed Wrist Watches IF YOU WANT AN INDIVID UALISTIC WATCH THEN LfiT US SHOW YOU SEVERAL OF OUR EXCEPTIONAL DESIGNS, ALL STANDARDIZED MOV AMENTS AND FULLY GUARAN TEE®, THE PRICES ARE REASONABLE AND THEY WSLL GIVE YOU EXCELLENT SERVICE. M- F- FICKETT JEWELRY CO. , Jewelers—Optometrists 268 CLAYTON ST. ATHENS, GA*