The Great Plains Area

This area includes parts of Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Wyoming, Colorado, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Texas.  It is the largest area of dry-farm land under approximately uniform conditions.  Its drainage is into the Mississippi, and it covers an area of not less than four hundred thousand square miles.  Dry-farm crops grow well over the whole area; in fact, dry-farming is well established in this district.  In spite of the failures so widely advertised during the dry season of 1894, the farmers who remained on their farms and since that time have employed modern methods have secured wealth from their labors.  The important question before the farmers of this district is that of methods for securing the best results.  From the Dakotas to Texas the farmers bear the testimony that wherever the soil has been treated right, according to approved methods, there have been no crop failures.

Canada

Dry-farming has been pushed vigorously in the semiarid portions of Canada, and with great success.  Dry-farming is now reclaiming large areas of formerly worthless land, especially in Alberta, Saskatchewan, and the adjoining provinces.  Dry-farming is comparatively recent in Canada, yet here and there are semiarid localities where crops have been raised without irrigation for upwards of a quarter of a century.  In Alberta and other places it has been now practiced successfully for eight or ten years, and it may be said that dry-farming is a well-established practice in the semiarid regions of the Dominion of Canada.

Mexico

In Mexico, likewise, dry-farming has been tried and found to be successful.  The natives of Mexico have practiced farming without irrigation for centuries—­and modern methods are now being applied in the zone midway between the extremely dry and the extremely humid portions.  The irregular distribution of the precipitation, the late spring and early fall frosts, and the fierce winds combine to make the dry-farm problem somewhat difficult, yet the prospects are that, with government assistance, dry-farming in the near future will become an established practice in Mexico.  In the opinion of the best students of Mexico it is the only method of agriculture that can be made to reclaim a very large portion of the country.

Brazil

Brazil, which is greater in area than the United States, also has a large arid and semiarid territory which can be reclaimed only by dry-farm methods.  Through the activity of leading citizens experiments in behalf of the dry-farm movement have already been ordered.  The dry-farm district of Brazil receives an annual precipitation of about twenty-five inches, but irregularly distributed and under a tropical sun.  In the opinion of those who are familiar with the conditions the methods of dry-farming may be so adapted as to make dry-farming successful in Brazil.

Australia