I thought it ni a waste of tho

I thought it ni a waste of tho State's money tor the highway to haul dirt off a macadam road, end also realized that it was a tremendous waste of my money when this dirt was my topsoil that had been washed on the highway by a recent rain.

Contour strip cropping nras our first step in conservation. The cultivation of the row crops, amino ly corn, was at first a little difficult because of so many short rows, but we soon realised that the extra work caused by the short rows was less than the saving in time through cultivating the much longer rows, which naturally resulted, and also the elimination of the necessity of pulling machines up and down hillsT^ ‘

Now when we have heavy reins, no more of our soil and fertiliser (washes to be hauled away by the highway Department, nor does it wash into Fleetwood Branch and head for the Rappahannock River. Our next move was to start using grass silage. After four yean we have gradually gone from 1,000 • tegs of earn silage to 800 tons of grass and 200 tons of corn. Our feeling is that grata silage is equally as good for the cows and certainly many times better for our land.

Along with our change in farm methods we have increased our livestock from a straight dairy operation to a better diversified one of dairy, beef, sheep, and hogs. This helps, as the prke of milk does not always cover the cost, or the drought hurts the quantity of milk we have to sell. We then have cattle or hogs to sell. It also enables us to use the extra grass and grain which resulted from better land use program.

Our farm at Mount Vernon in Sperryville, where Mr. G. M. Black successfully installed a conservation and land use program, followed the one nt Brandy by about two years.

He even set out an orehard on the contour. There was some doubt in our minds about this, but Mr. Henretty said that we would like it, and remembering our experience with strip cropping at Beauregard, we decided to go along with the contour orchard plan. We are simply delighted with ‘the results, and we are now resetting an old abandoned orehard on Turkey Mountain on the contour. By planting it this way we are able to get over the orchard and ’do the spraying and clipping with our machinery. This could not have been done with the old orchard set as it was up and down the mountain.

The conaervation and land use plans we have' been working on both farms are so satisfactory that I do not hesitate to be as enthusiastic a supporter as (Mr. Ragsdale and Mr. Black are. I recommended and almost insisted that my fox-hunting friend, Mr. James A. Saunders, ty Goochland

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I know he will foe a better friend than ever because of my recommendation.

Because of the plans that were laid out very clearly by Mr. Henretty and followed so well by Mr. Ragsdale and Mr. Black, I am confident that Mount Vernon, which has been in our family for five generations, and Beauregard;, which has been in for two, will be much better farms, and that the younger generations will find farming not only a pleasure but profitable.

Yours very truly,

J. Clifford Miller, Jr.