POSSIBILITIES OF SHELTERBELT PLANTING IN THE PLAINS REGION

CONTENTS

Plains settlement
Population
Importance of agriculture in the Plains
Characteristics of farming in the area
Social services and community life
Highways
Physical handicaps of the region
Land use

The first white men to penetrate the Plains region of North America labeled it a desert. This conception of the Plains persisted in the reports of explorers and travelers and in the minds of eastern writers up to the time of the Civil War.

The slow demise of the desert concept in the eastern part of the United States must in part be explained in the light of the traditional environment of the early colonists and their forebears. The colonists came from a humid, forested Europe and settled in a humid, forested America. In the traditional way land was cleared and planted to crops. By common consent it was held that only forested regions of the world were fertile and suitable for agricultural purposes. Geographical textbooks explaining the virtues of prairie lands for agricultural purposes did not exist. In fact it was never even suspected that such lands had much value. Thus when the pioneers first moved westward they sought wooded lands for farming. Records show that the early settlers in Illinois and Iowa sought the wooded flood plains first for their homesteads. Here the trees were cleared with great effort to provide farming land. Only by accident was it discovered that the prairie land and the interstream area was equally if not more productive. This ideology was largely responsible for the eastern suspicion of the prairie country, much of which they considered a desert.

In line with such a concept we need but to consider the Oregon migration in the forties. In this instance several thousand families extended the American frontier nearly 2,000 miles in one migration. They traveled an almost impossible distance and endured untold difficulties in moving from one forested section to another forested section. A distressingly large percentage of these immigrants succumbed on their journey because of hardships and Indian massacres. It is doubtful that these people would have made this migration if they had suspected the fertility of the prairie in Iowa and eastern Nebraska.

The myth of the American desert did not explode suddenly. Only locally and in restricted places did it give way. The garrisons at forts located to protect overland travel to the Pacific discovered that crops could be successfully raised in the less humid sections. Travelers, stranded on their way to the west coast, established themselves on the Plains and found the region suited to agriculture. But as late as 1859 Horace Greeley described the plains of western Kansas, over which he took a journey, as the "acme of barrenness and desolation." "This sand", he wrote, "seems to be as fine as Sahara can boast." He also left the seemingly contradictory slogan: "Young man, go west and grow up with the country."

PLAINS SETTLEMENT

The "desert" myth did at last disappear, so far as it attached to the Plains area, and modern observation even indicates that settlement, with strong governmental encouragement, overstepped the westward limits of safety, so far as the homesteading type of agriculture was concerned.

The pioneers who arrived in the sixties and seventies generally obtained land east of the ninety-eighth meridian, where rainfall was sufficient to produce fair crops, and even at the time of the Civil War the fringe of settlement had reached the Missouri River in its north-and-south extension, where the land was found highly productive. Such success on what had been called a desert led them to suspect that they were transforming an arid region into a humid region. Thus the theory of the immigration of rainfall was conceived and soon received wide-spread acceptance. The rather wet years in the late seventies and early eighties lent much encouragement to this contention. Prominent scientists, publicists, and clergymen accepted and encouraged this belief. Samuel Aughey, of the University of Nebraska, was perhaps the most prominent scientist to give dignity to the theory. In 1880 he wrote in his book, entitled "The Physical Geography and Geology of Nebraska", that increased rainfall resulted from cultivating the sod land of the prairie. Another prominent Nebraskan, C D. Wilber, who subscribed to the same theory, said that all deserts in the world existed because of the neglect of man. The plow and cultivated crops could change all that, according to his belief and writings.

The Homestead Act was passed May 20, 1862, providing for the entry of 160 acres by citizens and those who had declared their intentions to become citizens. An entry fee of $14 and 5 years' residence were required to "prove up" and obtain patent. The Homestead Act furnished the prime impetus to what may be called a mass movement of westward settlement. The Timber Culture Act of 1873, which added its momentum to the drive, is discussed elsewhere (pp. 51 to 52).

The Desert Land Act, passed in 1877, was the first significant change in the Homestead Act as applied to the Plains, recognizing, at least by name, that there was an arid element in western geography. It applied to the Territories of the Dakotas, Montana, Wyoming, New Mexico, and all States and Territories to the west of them. In 1893 it was also applied to Colorado. It allowed title to 640 acres per applicant, contemplating that the land should be irrigated.

In 1909 Congress passed the Enlarged Homestead Act, sometimes referred to as the "Dry Farming Act", which made it possible for settlers in 9 different States and Territories to secure 320 acres as a homestead. The act stipulated that one-fourth of the land was to be cultivated. This was found in many cases not to conform to physical conditions or the best use of the lands.

The Enlarged Homestead Act of 1909, the Stock Raising Act of 1916, and the Kincaid Act applying to western Nebraska recognized the transitional nature of the Plains as between a strictly agricultural status and more extensive forms of use. The Taylor Act of 1934, providing for Government regulation of the remaining public domain, finally recognized the difficulty of prescribing homestead acreages as a basis of land use on the more arid plains, as well as the need for the regulation of such use in the interests of the western grazing industry.

There was a phase of early homesteading known as commutation, which encouraged speculation in land. The commutation clause of the Homestead Act provided for issuing patents on the basis of 14 months' residence and after the payment of $1.25 per acre. With 6 months allowed to establish residence after filing, only 8 months of actual residence was necessary, and this could be adjusted to avoid residence during the severe months of winter by those who did not plan on settling permanently, or who were unable, at first, to construct comfortable homes. A number of early settlers took advantage of this clause after making their regular 5-year homestead entries. Meantime, many of them also took "tree claims." By this means, together with "preemption" or outright purchase of a quarter section at a nominal price, some acquired a total of 480 acres under the three forms of acquisition.

Early in the present century, as homestead lands became more scarce, and land more valuable, the commutation clause was used more extensively and often in land speculation. Veritable armies of people of small means who had lived previous to 1898 without thought of land now took advantage of their homestead opportunities—some earnestly, hoping to provide security against old age, but many speculatively, either on their own account or under inducement by other interested parties. A few years previous to 1898 deeded lands could be had for the cost of carrying the homestead to patent. By 1904 the average selling price for quarter sections in the Minot land district in North Dakota reached $1,922, and in the Devils Lake district, $1,706. These conditions were influenced by liberal opportunities to obtain loans on lands. In towns throughout the areas being newly settled numerous operators promoted real estate and real estate loans. Eastern capital came in freely. This provided a good market for the homesteader who wished to sell to someone who could not or had previously exercised his homestead right, or to a neighbor to enlarge his holdings.

Between 1898 and 1904, 11,778,000 acres were acquired in homesteads in North Dakota and 3,577,000 acres in South Dakota. Less than 35 percent of the entries made in the short space of 6 years were occupied either by original or subsequent owners. Less than 45 percent, under the most liberal allowances for necessity or adversity, had fulfilled the objects of the commutation clause, which was intended to aid the homemaker.

While the standard farm unit of 160 acres still persists in certain sections, in others the size is more frequently 320, 480, or 640 acres. Agriculturally, the region is new, and adjustments are still under way. Each dry period serves to eliminate some of the least securely attached farmers. Their lands tend to be taken over by others who remain, and the size of the typical farm in the West has been increased to several times the original homestead unit.

A study of transfers during the boom period has shown that 78 percent of them occurred within 1 year and 95 percent within 2 years after final proofs were made. Loans reached figures as high as $1,500 per quarter section, whereas before 1898 it was difficult to obtain $300 or $400.

This settlement boom, which extended into new frontiers in eastern Montana, Colorado, and other sections, was the last one of large proportions. As far as settlement was concerned, the erstwhile "American Desert" had been conquered. What happened later to the homesteader, to invested capital, to lending agencies, and to the progressive pioneer spirit of many good citizens is a much larger and more serious chapter in Plains history, which conditions of the past decade have made apparent to all and needs no commentary here.

POPULATION

In the large area now comprising the States of North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Colorado, Oklahoma, and Texas—across portions of which the shelterbelt zone will extend—about 10 per cent of the population was of foreign birth at the time of the 1870 census. Of these about 40 percent were of German origin and about 35 percent were from Great Britain. Other countries represented in decreasing numbers were Canada, Sweden, France, Bohemia, Austria, Norway, Switzerland, Denmark, Poland, Netherlands, Italy, Belgium, Hungary, Russia, and Asiatic countries. By 1880 the proportion of foreign-born residents had increased to about 23 percent of the total population, in the counties located wholly or partially within the zone area. The proportionate increase was nearly twice as great in the Dakotas as in the other States.

From 1880 to 1890 the proportion of foreign-born residents decreased, until in the latter year it constituted about 19 percent of the population. Here also, the northern States had the greater proportion of foreign-born, the proportion in North Dakota actually increasing by 10 percent.

Land-settlement programs played a large part in determining the nationality of the Plains settlers. There was a heavy migration from the older settled States by rail or over land, but also an effective advertising campaign was carried to the northern European countries by railroads seeking to sell land and settle farmers in territory served by the roads.

Railway agencies were very active in attracting settlers to North Dakota. They had a large amount of granted lands to dispose of. One road maintained a general European agency in London, with branches in Liverpool, Germany, Netherlands, and the Scandanavian countries, for the distribution of propaganda and the sale of their lands. In 1883 the company was maintaining 124 agencies in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Netherlands, Switzerland, and Germany. Land was advertised in 200 Canadian and American newspapers, in 68 German papers, and in 32 Scandinavian-American papers.

The Dakota territorial government in 1870 was also active. An office of commissioner of immigration was created. It was abandoned in 1877 but reestablished in 1885. Newspapers were very active in settlement propaganda. Some were printed in Norwegian. The trains were run principally by night through what were called the "poverty-stricken areas of Minnesota" and by day from Fargo to Bismarck, to keep immigrants interesteed only in the country in which their settlement was desired.

Immigration from Europe increased enormously during the early eighties. The size of land holdings compared with those at home was a revelation to immigrants. Settlers wrote back to relatives telling of remarkable opportunities in America with 160 acres "free or next to nothing."

IMPORTANCE OF AGRICULTURE IN THE PLAINS

The Plains region is our greatest wheat-producing section. More than half the Nation's spring wheat is produced in the two Dakotas. About half the winter wheat is grown in the Plains States, and nearly all the hard red winter wheat is produced in southern Nebraska, Kansas, the western half of Oklahoma, and the Texas Panhandle. The shelterbelt zone passes through the central part of the great wheat-producing region. East of the zone in North Dakota, Kansas, and Oklahoma lie the important areas of concentrated wheat production, in which yields are reasonably certain. West of the zone in these States and in Texas and Nebraska lie the areas in which wheat is grown on a large scale on mechanized farms, but in which droughts are common and the yields are uncertain.

Corn is less important than wheat. Although the tier of States which include the shelterbelt zone produces nearly one-fourth of the United States corn crop, most of it is grown east of thee zone. West of the zone, except in limited areas, corn is unimportant.

Barley and flax are relatively important crops in North Dakota and South Dakota. These two States produce one-fourth the barley and more than one-half the flaxseed grown in the United States.

Livestock is important, and previous to the recent severe droughts numbers of livestock had been consistently increasing in the shelterbelt area. In sections too rough for cultivation, cattle are produced on native grass. In sections producing corn or barley, hog numbers were increasing, and, particularly in the northern area, sheep were important.

CHARACTERISTICS OF FARMING IN THE AREA

The nature of the systems of farming and the characteristics of the people in the region are a product of the Great Plains environment. In the shelterbelt zone, as well as in the higher and drier sections to the west, farmers in working out an adjustment to the natural conditions have developed a system of farming unlike that followed in the humid sections to the east. The influencing factors are climate, soil, and topography. In a region of characteristically uncertain and variable rainfall, moisture is the essential element limiting crop production. Temperature, wind velocity, and the accompanying high rate of evaporation tend to intensify the situation created by a shortage of moisture. Differences in temperature and in the length of the growing season affect the adaptation of crops in different latitudes of the zone. Consequently there are wide differences in the farming systems and in the crops grown, but deficient rainfall is a probability in all sections, and the consequences of drought lend a similarity to the farm organizations throughout. Within local areas differences in topography and the nature of the soil may determine certain lines of production. In others, distance to market may limit the kinds of products.

The variability and the seasonal distribution of rainfall exert a dominant influence on the agriculture of the shelterbelt zone, although here the effect is less pronounced than on the extensive reaches of the Plains to the west. In a region such as the Panhandle country of Texas, where the annual rainfall seldom equals the normal rainfall of the humid farming sections in the eastern parts of the United States, the moisture supply is usually close to the minimum for crop production. If the normal precipitation of about 20 inches is considered, along with the high temperature and a variability which gives less than 15 inches of rain in 20 percent of the years, the uncertainty of crop production is apparent. Lack of sufficient moisture during the fall months to start and carry the wheat crop through the winter, or lack of moisture in the spring to grow and produce the crop, may lead to failure. In the northern Plains, with a lower evaporation, crop production can be and is carried on under conditions of lower annual precipitation, but here also moisture is deficient in a high proportion of the years. Under such conditions the farmer, over a period of years, can expect a few bumper crops, several fair-to-good crops, a number of crops that pay little more than the cost of harvest, and some seasons in which crops do not grow at all. It is in these ears of failure that the Plains farmer either sacrifices his livestock or maintains them at heavy expense on purchased feed, the productivity of the soil suffers from wind erosion, and the profits of past good years may be wiped out.

The greatest spring-wheat producing area of the United States centers in the shelterbelt zone in North Dakota. This is an area of specialized wheat and small-grain farms. Approximately half the cultivated land is normally seeded to wheat grown in combination with other spring-seeded crops such as barley, oats, and flax. Corn, if grown at all, provides a badly needed cultivated crop. It is usually cut for roughage rather than harvested for grain. The other adapted crops, being subject to the same seasonal influences as wheat, permit some diversification but add little to the possibility of avoiding crop failures. The most important hay crop is wild hay. Before the feed shortage of the recent droughty years forced liquidation of livestock, sheep, stock cattle, milk cows, and hogs were becoming more important as a source of farm income. It seemed desirable, during a period of livestock prices that were high relative to the prices of grain, to turn more to feed crops and livestock and to carry reserves of feed as insurance against dry years.

In South Dakota, with a longer growing season, farmers in the shelterbelt zone had shifted from a one-crop system of farming based on wheat to a system of general farming, in which wheat remained the most important single crop, but in which corn and feed grains replaced a large part of the former wheat acreage. Livestock, particularly hogs, were an important part of the farm business, although wheat was and is still the favored cash crop.

Corn is a more important crop than wheat in the general-farming sections of South Dakota and Nebraska, which represent the transition area between the centers of wheat and corn production. Yields average lower than in the Corn Belt proper, and crop production is less certain; but the livestock enterprises, cattle and hogs, resemble more closely the Corn Belt system than the Wheat Belt system of farming. In Nebraska the shelterbelt zone includes in its western portion an area which forms a transition zone between the sand hills and the farming country to the east and south. The land too sandy for cultivation is a hay and livestock section. Hay and pasture land may constitute as much as 60 percent of the area near the sand hills, although cultivated crops predominate in the portions nearer the farming sections. As the land is too sandy and too subject to blowing for wheat, corn is the major cultivated crop.

Where the shelterbelt zone crosses Kansas, no other crop approaches wheat in importance. For the most part, the area is level or rolling, with heavy, fertile soil which lends itself readily to wheat production with large equipment. Here the system of farming approaches most nearly a one-crop system. As the usual equipment enables 1 man to farm an acreage 2 or 3 times as great as could be handled even 15 years ago, the tendency is to increase the size of the farms and to operate on a large scale. Since, however, the size of farm was established during a period of horsepower farming, when agriculture was centered around the acreage that could be homesteaded, the farms are smaller than in the one-crop areas of western Kansas and the Panhandle of Texas. Yields average higher and are more reliable than in the western areas, corn and grain sorghums are more important as a regular part of the farm business, and livestock, particularly where rough land makes pasture available, is important.

Some diversification or replacement of wheat with feed crops is possible, but in this area, as in the northern sections of the shelterbelt zone, the farm program must aim to conserve moisture and to minimize the extent of soil blowing. Clean cultivation and the timeliness of field work play a large part in successful crop production. The shallow sandy soils, which intersperse the areas of heavy soil and extend in some cases from southwestern Nebraska to Texas, have proved to be the safest forage-crop land in the area. Corn or grain sorghums, used largely for cattle feeding, are the common crops.

In the southern extremity of the shelterbelt zone the Great Plains environment has given rise to a system of cotton production on a large scale. On the level to rolling land, in a climate which permits field work during most of the crop season, cotton is planted and cultivated with multiple-row equipment. Such equipment, used on large acreages, reduces the labor requirements of growing the crop. In some cases the stripper has replaced hand picking. Acre yields are not high and are variable, but little fertilizer is used, and here the tendency is for cotton acreage to continue its expansion.

In general, the climate of the Plains has placed on the farmer a limitation as to the types of crops that he can grow successfully. He operates on a relatively large acreage with the use of mechanical power and large units of equipment. Returns are highly variable from year to year, and moisture rather than fertility conservation is the primary consideration. On the lighter soils some crop cover is necessary to prevent wind erosion, and during long-continued periods of drought, when seeded crops do not germinate or grow and crop cover cannot be maintained, serious damage may follow.

In reality, the uncertainty of crop yields and fluctuations in prices make farming in the area a highly speculative undertaking. The hope of obtaining at some time a good yield and a high price carries the operator through discouraging periods of crop failure. Adverse periods have in the past eliminated those who could not adapt themselves to conditions, and those who remain continue to stake their own time and capital on an increased acreage against the hazards of climate, knowing that a series of good yields will compensate for the losses incurred during the years of failure.

As the farming business is highly commercialized, a large part of the costs of operating the farm must be met in cash. In addition to the farmers' own labor, some additional help must be hired. Fuel and oil for the tractor and repairs to equipment represent a cash outlay. These expenses, labor hire, and machinery operating costs made up 40 percent of the cost, other than the farmers' own labor, of operating farms in a wheat section in southwest Kansas. An allowance for replacement of machinery made up 25 percent more. If the operator is an owner he must pay the taxes on his farm or allow them to become delinquent. If the farm is mortgaged, interest and payments on the principal must be met. Consequently a dry year leaves him with little reduction in expenses. If feed for livestock and seed must be purchased, the expense may even be increased. The farm returns nothing for his labor, and, at the best, living expenses must be reduced and debts allowed to accumulate. On the other hand, a happy combination of yields and favorable prices provides funds for meeting expenses, reducing debts, replacing equipment, and improving living conditions. Too frequently the prosperity of a few years recalls the belief that the climate is changing or leads the farmer to think that at last he has learned the method of controlling the natural environment. The losses of the poor years are forgotten, and new indebtedness is taken on to enlarge the size of the farm and to provide equipment to operate the increased acreage.

SOCIAL SERVICES AND COMMUNITY LIFE

The different States in recent years have given special study to community questions. In 1927 (before the depression) such a study, by the rural sociological department of South Dakota State College, of typical east-central South Dakota conditions, showed that 87 percent of the farmers and their families were well satisfied with the farm as a home and as a mode of living. Very little dissatisfaction was registered against any of the community services, such as the church, school, library, and local government. Also the local marketing, credit, and trading facilities were fairly satisfactory to most farmers. The farmer's chief concern seemed to be his apparent economic inequalities as compared with capital and labor. As evidence of this he pointed to low labor income, mortgage foreclosures, and increased taxation. For the past few years many farmers have looked to State and Federal legislation as a means of obtaining economic relief, although feeling at the same time that farm relief is a group problem whose solution must come through group organization and action. In general, the farmers and their wives indicated that they would undertake farming if starting over again, and they were encouraging their children to remain on the farm.

On the other hand, a study of high-school education of farm boys and girls in South Dakota in 1930 showed that three-fourths of the farm pupils attending high school did not return to the farms, although vocational training in agriculture and home economics seemed to be an influence favoring their return. Many farmers' children had to patronize some other district as tuition pupils at an average cost of $110.61 for the school year—a total tuition bill for the rural districts of over $1,000,000. It was concluded, however, that it would not pay to build up a separate high-school system, but that it would be wise for agriculture to throw in its lot with the townspeople.

The North Dakota Agricultural Experiment Station in a bulletin by E. A. Wilson (1928) on the social organizations and agencies in that State, shows that the State is well provided with religious agencies from the standpoint of number of churches, but there was lack of efficient organization. Organizations and agencies designed to provide recreation and social life were many and varied, but most of them were located or centered in the towns and cities. Relatively few farmers participated in the activities of social climbs and societies, although patronizing extensively moving picture-shows and pool and dance halls. Library service was available to very few people. The author concludes that "if farm children are to remain on the land, farming must not only be profitable but life on the farm must be satisfying."

A bulletin published in January 1928, on rural changes in western North Dakota showed that almost 70 percent of the farm residences were good to fair, but very few had modern conveniences. Compared with areas in the eastern part of the State, which had been settled twice as long, there were fewer good farmsteads and fewer home and cultural conveniences; but this is a condition typical of newly-settled areas. More girls than boys continue their education beyond the grades. A larger proportion of boys than girls remain on the farm after finishing school. Counties in which the nationality of the farmers is predominantly German or Russian showed smaller decreases in the number of farms than other counties. Of the farm operators who left the farms from 1920 to 1926, inclusive, 40 percent left for economic reasons, and financial difficulties were responsible for the departure of three-fourths of these.

Almost three-fourths of present operators attended church, as compared to 60 percent of former operators. Nationality, which is closely related to church denominations, is a more influential factor in church going than distances to church. Relatively few farmers, and a less proportion of farmers' wives, belong to lodges or other social organizations located in towns. They are more inclined to affiliate with rural social organizations. Social organizations for the young people, other than boys' and girls' 4-H clubs, are few in number. More than 90 percent of the farm operators queried in this North Dakota study said they "liked their community." Community clubs are most numerous in the counties which have had county extension agents for the longest periods.

Social services and community life vary by nationalities and for other local or regional reasons; but the observations in the Dakotas are doubtless more or less typical in these times of rapid transport and communication and the somewhat centralized direction and assistance by both the Federal and the State government in agricultural, community, and other rural affairs. There is no longer enforced isolation among rural populations. These things have tended toward common thinking, related viewpoints, and similar social customs.

HIGHWAYS

In the shelterbelt zone there are nearly 6,000 miles of all-weather surfaced roads of all types. In addition many miles of graded and maintained earth roads can be used for the major portion of each year. No point within the entire zone is more than 20 miles distant from at least one improved roadway which can be traveled at all times of the year. Whereas it was formerly customary for a large percentage of automobiles to be stored during the winter months, year-round travel by automobile throughout the area is now commonplace.

PHYSICAL HANDICAPS OF THE REGION

Drought and winds, hail, cloudbursts, occasional extreme cold, and their influences on agrarian pursuits contribute the principal physical handicaps to present-day agriculture of the plains. The farmer, even with improved defenses from these attacks, must pit himself against all their uncertainties, any one of which may completely upset his calculations. They have placed the farmer in much of the Plains area in a position of "gambling with nature" that pales the operator on the board of trade.

Of late years, with the subduing of the soil and the removal of root fibers and other soil-binding material, wind and gully erosion are removing untold millions in capital values. A shortage of domestic and stock water is a large handicap over broad areas, although considerable relief has been obtained by the sinking of deep wells. Drought exerts very direct effects on water resources through the lowering of water tables and the drying up of erstwhile adequate wells and other sources of supply. About 1,000 sand-hill lakes in Nebraska dried down to or near their beds in 1934, and the larger areas become shallower and smaller. Livestock suffered more from lack of water in some critical areas than from pasture shortage. Many marshes, lakes, and streams went dry. Municipal water supplies had to be extended and many new irrigation wells made. The worst local feature of the prolonged drought was exhaustion of drinking-water supplies. Droughts serve to make people water-minded and less wasteful of water from whatever source. Some of the States have attempted to regulate improvident uses of artesian flows.

LAND USE

There is little question that large areas of land in the entire plains region have been abused. To prevent wind and water erosion, some land should be kept permanently in sod. The report of the National Resources Board traces to the manner of disposing of the land many present abuses of land. To survive as a farmer, one may be forced to accept the short-time exploitative point of view. Even the farmer who wishes to adopt a system which will eliminate erosion or loss of soil fertility may find the conservative way of farming impractical. For this reason controlled land use appears unavoidable. Land subject to loss from blowing may be protected, by shelterbelts, and different cultural methods, or restored to natural cover. Some land unsuited to cultivation, but which was plowed for the sake of 1 or 2 crops, could well be used as pasture land to achieve that balance between cash crops, permanent grass, and livestock production which will add to the stability of agriculture in what is now an area of speculative farming.