Sustainable Farming

The hog is an animal for which we have no especial liking, be he either a tender suckling, nosing and tugging at the well-filled udder of his dam, or a well-proportioned porker, ba...

The word _soil_ occurs many times in this little book. In agriculture this word is used to describe the thin layer of surface earth that, like some great blanket, is tucked around...

A wise man was once asked, "What is the most valuable improvement ever made in agriculture?" He answered, "Drainage." Often soils unfit for crop-production because they contain too...

The Cotswold, New Oxford, and Leicester sheep, of the long-wooled variety, are also highly esteemed, in the same capacity as the Southdowns. They are large; not so compactly built...

We hear a great deal about the exhaustion or wearing out of the soil. Many uncomfortable people are always declaring that our lands will no longer produce profitable crops, and hen...

A good many years ago a man by the name of Jethro Tull lived in England. He was a farmer and a most successful man in every way. He first taught the English people and the world th...

In the early days of our history, when the soil was new and rich, we were not compelled to use large amounts of manures and fertilizers. Yet our histories speak of an Indian named...

Among the useful and convenient appendages to the farm and country family establishment, is the ice-house. Different from the general opinion which prevailed in our country before...

The farm barn, next to the farm house, is the most important structure of the farm itself, in the Northern and Middle States; and even at the south and southwest, where less used,...

This is a design of barn partially on the Pennsylvania plan, with under-ground stables, and a stone-walled basement on three sides, with a line of posts standing open on the yard f...

Hard-wood ashes have ceased to have much importance as a source of lime for land, but their use is held in high esteem even by those who regard fertilizers as mere stimulants and d...

The sheep was perhaps the first animal domesticated by man, and to-day the domesticated sheep is found wherever man lives. It is found domesticated or wild in almost every climate,...

Salt is not a direct fertilizer, and its use is not to be advised unless it can be secured at a very low price per ton. Some soils have been made more productive by the application...

The land should be fitted as it is for corn. Light, sandy soils require little preparation, and too often the seeding is made in a woefully careless manner, the chief dependence be...

The use of muck pays in stables, as it is a good absorbent and contains some nitrogen which gains in availability by mixture with manure. Its direct application to land as a fertil...

The light soils of Maryland, New Jersey, and the southern states are not naturally rich in phosphoric acid or potash. The cowpea can draw its nitrogen from the air, but on all thin...

The great empires of antiquity were doomed to certain decay and dissolution by a radical vice inherent in their political and social constitution. Power rapidly built up a great ca...

Irrigation is the name given to the plan of supplying water in large quantities to growing crops. Since the dawn of history this practice has been more or less followed in Asia, in...

What do birds do in the world? is an important question for us to think about. First, we must gain by observation and by personal acquaintance with the living birds a knowledge of...

Whoever finds himself the newly installed owner and occupant of a farm, should, before doing much beyond growing a crop in the ordinary way, study well its character, determine its...