Excerpt from Factors of Successful Farming Near Monett, Mo: February 25, 1918
The soil of this region was formed mostly from limestone in which was imbedded a considerable amount of flint, sometimes in rather large masses. The limestone itself was dissolved out by rain water carrying small quantities of carbonic-acid gas in solution, leaving the impurities of the limestone (consisting mainly of small or large particles of flint) to constitute the resulting soil. On the slopes, where the finer particles of soil have been washed away, the land is rocky, the rocks consisting of angular fragments of flint, for the most part from 1 to 3 or 4 inches in diameter. Elsewhere, especially where the land was originally covered with blackjack timber, the soil is rather gravelly. The alluvial soil of the bottoms contains more or less gravel. On the higher ridges, which were originally prairie, the soil is somewhat finer in texture and less inclined to be gravelly. These prairie soils were formed in part from shales. On the whole, the soil may be described as gravelly loam or gravelly silt loam. Like most medium to heavy soils, it is fairly fertile, especially when abundantly supplied with decaying organic matter such as manure and the refuse from crops.
The first settlers who came into this region came mainly from wooded regions and took up land along the streams. Most of the stream bottoms have been in cultivation for about three-quarters of a century. About 40 or 45 years ago farmers began to come into the region from prairie districts, especially from Illinois. These settled on the prairies. The prairie lands have thus been in cultivation somewhat less than half a century.
The wooded slopes between the prairies and the bottom lands have been cleared and put into cultivation mainly during the last 30 years, the amount of woodland left being scarcely sufficient to supply local farm needs.
The Local Agriculture.
Wheat is decidedly the most important of the local crops at the present time, corn being second in importance. The percentage of the crop area devoted to wheat for the crop year 1913-14 on the farms included in this survey was 48.8, or practically half of the entire area. Corn occupied 25.1 per cent. The position of these two crops, so far as acreage is concerned, has been practically reversed in the last 20 years. In 1890, according to the census for that year, corn occupied 46 per cent of the crop area in Barry County and 41 per cent in Lawrence County. In the same year wheat occupied 24 per cent of the crop area of Barry County and 33 per cent in Lawrence County.
The reason for this change in the status of wheat and corn in this locality is not known definitely.
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