Thursday, November 27, 1941
Heppner Gazette Times, Heppner, Oregon
Page Three
Oregon Specialty
Crops Reflect
Benefits To All
By E. R. JACKMAN,
Extension Specialist in Farm Crops
Specialty crops have been increas
ing in Oregon the last few years,
reflecting benefits all the way 'round.
Working on the theory that a farmer
specialist may be able to command
a little more money per acre or per
hour of work, Oregon farmers are
growing such a long list of things
that the list itself would fill a whole
column of the Gazette Times or
more.
Of course farmers have been aid
ed in this specialization by the
state's amazing diversity of climate
perhaps more diverse than that of
any other state. We have climate
about like that to be found in most
any part of the inhabited globe ex
cept the tropical parts. At that, one
county, Curry, grows palms and eu
calyptus trees. Rainfall varies from
5 to 100 inches and elevations in
Oregon may be sea-level or 10,000
feet above, depending upon where
one is standing at the time. As a
result we grow hops, pansy seed,
cascara bark, digitalis, lilies, salmon,
ferns, lawn grass seed, mink, and a
hundred other things that scarcely
enter into the scheme of the farmer'
in North Dakota or Kansas.
Let's look at the seed business
first because that is the biggest of
all our specialty crops. Nearly every
county in the state grows seed of
some kind, and Oregon is literally
the nation's seed warehouse. The
coast produces nearly 100 per cent
of the nation's golf course seed.
Most wheat farmers aren't golfers,
although a few have been bitten by
the bug, but when one takes a trip
East or South and sees folks chas
ing a silly little ball around, they
-are doing it on a turf made green
by bentgrass seed from Oregon.
Then there is the cover crop seed
business. Vetches and peas for plow
ing down in the South I didn't say
for plowing down South I said for
plowing down in the South were
seeded on about 350,000 acres in Or
egon this fall. That makes up about
90 per cent of this kind of seed in
the nation and should return around
$8,000,000 in 1942 to Oregon farmers
if all goes well.
Alfalfa and the various clovers are
growing for seed production on 50,-
000 Oregon acres scattered all over
the state. Crook. Deschutes, and
Klamath counties grow about one-
fifth of the nation's alsike clover
seed, and Malheur county grows
more red clover seed than any other
United States county. Josephine and
Malheur counties grow half the na
tion's Ladino clovjer.
Union county sparked by the
Blue Mountain Seed Growers asso
ciation is a factor in the grass seed
business. In fact for the last four
... i i
years the associataon nas nanuieu
the largest pool of crested wheat
grass seed in the United States and
returned growers more net money.
Union county also has the highest
average vield of Chewrng fescue
seedV-another lawn grass.
That doesn't exhaust the seed bus
iness by any means. Wallowa coun
ty, for example, is growing seed of
canning peas, and the Hermiston
country produces strawberry clover.
We have sugar beet seed in Jackson
and seed of native wild grasses in
Lake and Harney counties. But en
ough of seed, or we'll all go to seed
reading about it. Anyhow, Oregon
can justly be called a hayseed state
we grow it by the trainload. There
really is hayseed in Old Man Ore
gon's whiskers.
When Hitler blitzed the low coun
he blitzed the world's bulb
business as well. Holland has tra
ditionally been the home of the tulip,
but modern crossing and breeding
techniques have produced dozens of
varieties and strains of bulbs of
which most of us don't even know
the names. Fortunately, in anticipa
tion of European war, Oregon farm
ers had been experimenting with
bulbs all over the state and when
the emergency came a big group of
our people had learned, as the lum
berjack put it "to buck bulbs" and
they are now bucking them to the
tune of a million dollars. Gladiolus,
narcissus, iris, tulips, lilies, dahlias
A SPECIALTY CROP THAT CLICKED
fi - . J
, pa
The pea harvest in parts of eastern Oregon has proven a boon to
wheat growers. This is a typical scene of what takes place when the peas
are taken from the field.
NATION ONLY AS
STRONG AS ITS SOIL
the people at the present time rec
ognize that the soil is the vital pub
lic resource of the nation held in
trust by the farmers for all the peo
ple. We know that many farmers are
not financially able to put into prac
tice needed conservation practices.
For these reasons, government ag
encies have been set up and pro
visions made in other agencies for
helping the farmers conserve our na
tion's soil.
The Soil Conservation Service, the
Soil Conservation Program of the
AAA, organized State Soil Conser
vation Districts, and Land Use Plan
ning are all working to help the
farmer with his erosion problems
by supplying needed technical and
financial assitance and help in wor
king out and planning his agricul
ture on a sound, long-time basis.
Fanners of Morrow and part of
Umatilla county recently organized
the Heppner Soil Conservation Dist
rict including more than 700,000
acres. This district is the largest of
its kind in Oregon. It extends from
the crest of the watershed in the
south about half way across the
county.
This and similar districts are un
der the direct supervision of five
farmer supervisors, three of whom
are elected by the farmers and two
appointed by the State Soil Conser
vation Committee.
Being organized under such a dis
trict puts the farmers in a better po
sition to obtain available help in
erosion control. Help will be at a
minimum during the present world
conflict, but following the war the
farmers of soil conservation districts,
organized and having their programs
drawn up, will be more apt to re
ceive the available help then.
The work that individual farmers
can do without public assistance will
probably outweigh all else if they
will study their farms and plan their
crops and farming practices in such
a way as to hold their soil before it
is gone.
As soil is lost, so is moisture, and
the moisture -holding properties of
the soil, and nothing need be said
of the importance of moisture in the
Columbia Basin.
Farmers can not only do a great
deal on their own, but now have
public backing and government as
sistance in combating their soil loss
es. This assistance came too late to
save all of our soil, but if we avail
ourselves of the machinery now set
up to help us help ourselves our soil
losses in the future should be cut to
a minimum.
By C. D. CONRAD
County Agent, Morrow County
The American farmer has come to
the point where he must be content
with making his living and continu
ing to make that living, on the land
he now possesses. The time is past
when there is new land to turn to
when the old is worn out.
Soil erosion by wind and water is
one of the farmers' oldest enemies.
For centuries the fertile topsoil, from
and many others all grow in Ore
gon. Ever notice what pretty names
the bulbs have? Some pecple would
rather grow a narcissus lhan a hog
iust because it sounds nicer.
Fiber flax is another product not
grown much in the United States
except in Oregon. We had over 10,-
000 acres of it in 1941, and the acre
age is growing fast in order to make
our linen handkerchief users inde
pendent of foreign countries. Even
those hardy souls who don't use 'em
may need linen for sewing up shoes,
and if they join the navy they'll
find linen cordage of various kinds.
Anyhow, Oregon is the only state
doing much about fiber flax.
Then in fur farming we are step
ping up. We are growing mink coats
by the thousands and fox collars,
and all sorts of lesser animals that
we may sell for muskrat and buy
back again as Hudson seal. We
have a few sensitive and sensible
folks who are even growing stand
back please skunk. The farm in
come from our fur farms is well
over the half million mark.
"For you a rose , in Portland
grows," but even more important,
for the gardens of North America
carloads of rose plants grow in Ore
gon. Roses and other nursery plants
urn off close to a million dollars
for Oregon fanners specializing in
those things. Oregon is also the
principal state shipping holly at
Christmas, and western Oregon far
mers get out and gather wild fern
and ship it by the carload.
One could ramble on pleasantly
through a whole page full of odd
and unusual products. We have a
million dollars' worth of filberts and
about the same amount of walnuts.
We have luscious berries not grown
much any place else and even $75,000
worth of cranberries, grown in bogs
along the coast. When you buy a
gooseberry pie in Kansas City or
Atlanta, the chances are its filling
came from Woodburn in Marion
county. Hops are hopped up by the
war much like the ultimate consum
ers may be, and they are giving the
growers over $5,000,000 this year.
Peppermint oil, sugar beets, flax
seed, canning peas all these things
will swell the total of these special
ty crops to probably $30,000,000 in
1942 maybe more.
These crops occupy land that for
merly grew wheat, oats, barley, and
hay, so their production is not only
helping the growers, but it is help
ing those who produce the other
things. When we take 100,000 acres
out of wheat and grow Austrian
winter peas on that acreage, it is a
real help to other wheat growers.
which plants gather all their food
requirements excepting water, has
been gradually carried away leaving
the raw unproductive mineral soil
below. This soil loss has been' accel
erated by the plowing up of native
sod for raising cultivated crops.
We must realize that farmers must
make their living from the soil and
to do this they must continue to
grow what we call soil depleting
crops. But if these same farmers or
these farmers' children plan to con
tinue making their living from the
soil, they must, while making that
living, take definite steps to con-j
serve the soil and its fertility.
The strength of a nation, and es
pecially an agricultural nation such
as ours, is determined by the pro
ductiveness of that nation's soil.
When our soil is gone so will all
our people be gone, for from the soil
we gather either directly or in
directly all our necessities of life.
It seemed ridiculous to many of
our forefathers that land would ever
be scarce and that soil erosion would
ever become a serious problem. Not
all people were of that belief how
ever. Nearly two centuries ago a few
foresighted individuals were advo
cating practices that would save our
soil rather than waste it. More and
more people have become aware of
this fact until a large majority of
CONDON
GRAIN
GROWERS
Condon, Oregon
We urge all people of this area to
attend the E. 0. W. L. the farmer's
strongest and best organization.
We wish the League its usual con
vention success.
ackson Implement Co
McCormick-Deering Dealers
Complete Shop and Parts Service
NASH CARS
Lexington, Oregon
Heavy Duty Replacement Parts
for Caterpillars
Used Tractors and Dozers
1030 S. E. Water Ave. - Portland, Oregon