Rensselaer Union, Volume 8, Number 6, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 October 1875 — Making Full Use of Capital. [ARTICLE]

Making Full Use of Capital.

A good business man wishes to keep all his capital employed—we use the word capital in its general sense. If he has money to. loan he prefers to take a less rate of interest if thereby he secures the certainly of having the money loaned for a long time. If he l>c a day-laborer, with nothing but his muscle, he will do well to accept steady employment rather than depend on the chance of odd jobs even at higher rates. So the farmer should endeavor so to arrange bis plans that his land, his teams, his live-stock and himself, and hired laborers shall be, engaged in producing something during the greater part of each year. As has often been pointed out, it is one of the great disadvantages of a system of farming which relies on growing the small grains that it does not keep the farmer anti his teams employed during tile whole year. On the other hand live-stock raising, and especially dairying, has the advantage of allowing labor to be profitably employed nearly every day of the year. The difference in the two systems is very marked; more so than is otten realized. In one other most important matter very many farmers are not careful to keep their full capital employed—and that is in making full use of their land. The fact that land could be obtained at very low prices and that the rKe in prices formed an important part, if not the chief part, of the profit to farming has in some respects been a disadvantage to our farming. When one could buy land at $1.25 pet. acre, and in ten or twenty years sell it at $lO, S2O, SOO or SSO per acre, lie would have done well if his farming paid the interest, taxes, and his current expenses. Something of this kind happened so'often that a large number of farmers, more or less unconsciously, are holding their lands with a view of profit from the general increase in value rather than from their direct farming operations.

As a country grows older and more thickly' settled the time approaches when this source of profit cannot be - relied on; when farmers must expect profit, if at all, from their yearly crops. This makes betters arming necessary,. __ Taxes are high, and land which is nonproductive is taxed as well as that which is bringing good crops each year. Fences are costly, and as much so around unproductive as productive land. If tlie land is not paid for the interest is the same whether the land is being “madeto pay” or is doing nothing. Yet while all this is true, there are very many farms on which five, ten or twenty acres can be found almost any year which are practically producing nothing. A pasture or meadow which iias “run out” is still kept up; a field is left fallow, to grow up in weeds; timber land, from which all that is valuable has been cut, is left year ;ifte,r year. The disposition to have a large farm often leads to the purchase of so much land that very little money is left for stocking it, or so much that means cannot he had to properly conduct it. Certainly it is the part of wisdom to make the best possible use of all the land. - It may not be advisable, in tlie West, to practice what we call high farming, but there can be no doubt that it is advisable to secure crops from all the land owned. Western Farmer.