Excerpt from Technical Skill for Soil and Water Conservation

Most farmers of the Nation now recognize the importance of soil and water conservation. They are practicing conservation more and more each year. Farmers and landowners have organized more than soil-conservation districts in the United States and its possessions These districts cover more than acres and include more than three-fourths of all the farms and ranches of the country. Around farmers and ranchers in these districts have made detailed conserva tion plans with the aid of trained soil conservation technicians. They are carrying out all types of land use and conservation practices needed on their farms and ranches in cooperation with their soil conservation districts. And there are many other farmers who are using some type of soil and water conservation practice. Furthermore, many farmers who are not practicing conservation might do so if they knew what to do and how to do it. And many of those who are now using some conservation measures might use more if they knew exactly what was needed.

Many soil conservation measures, especially annual farm practices, are so simple that farmers need no technical assistance in applying them. Control of weeds, for example, while not always easy, usually is simple in method and generally beneficial in effect. Barnyard manure is so generally beneficial to cr0ps it can be used freely wherever available. Its application is a matter of simple mechanics. Lime also is almost always helpful on land having a ph value of or less; it is applied with simply Operated lime Spreaders. Cover crops provide needed protection to cultivated land dur ing those periods when the regular crops are not growing or are too small to give substantial protection against erosion and leaching. Usually no particular difficulty is involved in their use.

But the principal soil-conserva tion measures are complicated in their application and call for thorough technical understanding of their purposes and of how to apply them. They are generally used in combination with one another, and each must fit the land in a pattern of mutual support. Their application always must conform with the principles of hydrology, engineering, and agronomy. Both training and experience are necessary here. N 0 amount of in-door training can take the place of actual experience on the land in this connection. Under varying conditions of topography and drainage, the wrong thing done, or the right thing left undone, on any part of the farm can do serious injury to the entire farm.

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