agronomy

"American farmers produced 600 more calories per person per day in 2000 than they did in 1980. But some calories got cheaper than others: Since 1980, the price of sweeteners and added fats (most of them derived, respectively, from subsidized corn and subsidized soybeans), dropped 20 percent, while the price of fresh fruits and vegetables increased by 40 percent"

"Inhabitants of underdeveloped nations and victims of natural disasters are the only people who have ever been happy to see soybeans."

"The ancient Asian practice of fermenting soybeans and eating soy in the form of curds called tofu makes a healthy diet from a plant that eaten almost any other way would make people ill. The soybean itself is a notably inauspicious staple food; it contains a whole assortment of "antinutrients"—compounds that actually block the body's absorption of vitamins and minerals, interfere with the hormonal system, and prevent the body from breaking down the proteins in the soy itself. It took the food cultures of Asia to figure out how to turn this unpromising plant into a highly nutritious food."

"Corn is an efficient way to get energy calories off the land and soybeans are an efficient way of getting protein off the land, so we've designed a food system that produces a lot of cheap corn and soybeans resulting in a lot of cheap fast food."

"Soy protein products can be good substitutes for animal products because, unlike some other beans, soy offers a 'complete' protein profile. … Soy protein products can replace animal-based foods—which also have complete proteins but tend to contain more fat, especially saturated fat—without requiring major adjustments elsewhere in the diet."

"The herbicide known as 2,4-D has had limited use in corn and soybean farming because it becomes toxic to the plants early in their growth. The new seeds would let farmers use the weed killer throughout the plants’ lives."

"We should increase our development of alternative fuels, taking advantage of renewable resources, like using corn and sugar to produce ethanol or soybeans to produce biodiesel."

"Farmers have been eager for a new generation of herbicide-resistant seeds because of the prevalence of weeds that have become immune to Monsanto’s Roundup. But skeptics are concerned that use of the new seeds and 2,4-D will only lead to similar problems as weeds acquire resistance to that chemical too."

"… agronomy is this classification is divided into farm crops, crop pests, soils and fertilizers."

"Notwithstanding the willingness of many farmers, in spite of the knowledge and capital which many of thein have devoted to it, it is established that agriculture, or father agronomy, is still, in this country, only in an embryo state."

"Agronomy is that division of the Agricultural College work which relates to the field and its crops and has to do with investigation and instruction along the lines of (a) Farm management; the application of economic business methods to farm (b) Farm Crops; their production and improvement, (c) Soils; their fertility, cultivation, and improvement, (d) Farm Mechanics; the tools, machinery, fences and drains of the farm."

"Agronomy; or a Treatise on the Constituent Parts and Physical Properties of the Soil, and the best Method of acquiring a Knowledge of the different Earths, and ascertaining their Value."

"On M. Thaer's Principes Raisonne's D'agriculture. The high reputation attached to the author of this publication as a scientific and practical agriculturist, independently of his other claims to consideration, as well as the intrinsic character of the work itself, render it incumbent on us to no. tice it... The work, besides an appendix or atlas of various tables and plates, consists of four large octavo volumes... The second volume makes its appearance, with a long and able preface from the translator, which is in effect a digest of the principles of vegetation, and of agricultural chemistry. The second section is concluded at a very early part of this volume; and the third section commences under the head of agronomy, which, as the translator informs us, should be read with great attention, in order to extract its matter with full advantage to the reader. This section first treats of the component parts of soils, and the author goes deeply into this interesting subject, noticing at considerable length lime, chalk, marl, gypsum, the nature and effects of humus, and its different combinations with the elementary earths and atmospheric influences; and then succeeds a vast deal under the particular head of agriculture (first part), which, in our simplicity, we had imagined to have been essentially the subject on which we had been before engaged. This division comprehends first manures, animal, vegetable, and mineral, a sequence to the "constituent and physical properties of soils and the mode of judging of land," contained in the preceding division — agronomy — but designed principally to explain the modus operandi of manuring substances; with a great deal which seems in some respects a repetition of points previously discussed under the head of agronomy, and which might better have been included in it."

"The study of the soil is known as "Agronomy," but, from the foregoing remarks, it will be seen that agronomy is not in itself a science, but expresses the bearing of several recognised branches of science upon the study of soils."

"It is probable that the substitution of a more definite and technical term for agriculture in its restricted sense would simplify matters. The term agronomy is tentatively suggested as such a term..."

"The word "agronomy" is the short way of indicating agriculture, horticulture, viticulture, arboriculture, dairying, breeding of live stock, beekeeping, &c."

"Biotechnology procedures that permit the easy asexual transfer of genes among microorganisms, when and if mastered for higher plants, hold the potential for transferring desired genes across species, genera, and perhaps family barriers. Let your imagination roam - the high lysine trait from the pigweed might be used to improve the quality of maize protein. 'The resistance of maize to wheat stem rust might be used to make wheat resistant to this disease. The gene for tolerance to Al[uminum] toxicity in wheat might make maize tolerant to Al[uminum]... The future for agronomy is not only bright, but it has no foreseeable bounds."

"An housbande can not well thryue by his come without he haue other cattell, nor by his cattell without come. For els he shall be a byer, a borrower or a beggar."

"Centuries of husbandry, decades of diligent culling, the work of numerous hearts and hands, have gone into the hackling, sorting, and spinning of this tightly twisted yarn. Furthermore, we have not even to risk the adventure alone; for the heroes of all time have gone before us; the labyrinth is thoroughly known; we have only to follow the thread of the hero-path. And where we had thought to find an abomination, we shall find a god; where we had thought to slay another, we shall slay ourselves; where we had thought to travel outward, we shall come to the center of our own existence; and where we had thought to be alone, we shall be with all the world."

"Agronomy is the science that, taking advantage of ecological principles, devices and tests new approaches, rules and means to govern the relationships between the different production factors in order to obtain an appropriate harvest."

"I was an apprentice to a linnen-draper when this king was born, and continued at the trade some years, but the shop being too narrow and short for my large mind, I took leave of my master, but said nothing. Then I lived a country-life for some years; and in the late wars I was a soldier, and sometimes had the honour and misfortune to lodg and dislodg an army. In the year 1G52, I entred upon iron works, and pli'd them several years, and in them times I made it my business to survey the three great rivers of England, and some small ones; and made two navigable, and a third almost compleated. I next studied the great weakness of the rye-lands, and the surfeit it was then under by reason of their long tillage. I did by practick and theorick find out the reason of its defection, as also of its recovery, and applyed the remedy in putting out two books, which were so fitted to the country-man's capacity, that he fell on pell-mell; and I hope, and partly know, that great part of Worcestershire, Glocestershire, Herefordshire, Shropshire, and Staffordshire, have doubled the value of the land by the husbandry discovered to them; see my two books printed by Mr Sawbridg on Ludgate Hill, entitled, Yarranton's Improvement ly Clover, and there thou mayest be further satisfied.* I also for many years served the countreys with the seed, and at last gave them the knowledg of getting it with ease and small trouble; and what I have been doing since, my book tells you at large."

"Ill husbandry braggeth To go with the best: Good husbandry baggeth Up gold in his chest."

"February, fill the dyke With what thou dost like."

"Ill husbandry lieth In prison for debt: Good husbandry spieth Where profit to get."

"To the art of mechanics is owing all sorts of instruments to work with, all engines of war, ships, bridges, mills, curious roofs and arches, stately theatres, columns, pendent galleries, and all other grand works in building. Also clocks, watches, jacks, chariots, carts and carriages, and even the wheel-barrow. Architecture, navigation, husbandry, and military affairs, owe their invention and use to this art."

"To any thinking person, it must be obvious that there is something badly wrong in relations between human beings and the animals that human beings rely on for food; and that in the past 100 or 150 years whatever is wrong has become wrong on a huge scale, as traditional animal husbandry has been turned into an industry using industrial methods of production. [...] It would be a mistake to idealise traditional animal husbandry as the standard by which the animal-products industry falls short: traditional animal husbandry is brutal enough, just on a smaller scale. A better standard by which to judge both practices would be the simple standard of humanity: is this truly the best that human beings are capable of?"

"The fundamental core of contemporary Darwinism, the theory of DNA-based reproduction and evolution, is now beyond dispute among scientists. It demonstrates its power every day, contributing crucially to the explanation of planet-sized facts of geology and meteorology, through middle-sized facts of ecology and agronomy, down to the latest microscopic facts of genetic engineering."

"Agronomy is the scientific management of land to practice effective soil conservation and to maximize crop production."

"Ancient poetry and mythology suggest, at least, that husbandry was once a sacred art; but it is pursued with irreverent haste and heedlessness by us, our object being to have large farms and large crops merely. We have no festival, nor procession, nor ceremony, not excepting our cattle-shows and so-called Thanksgivings, by which the farmer expresses a sense of the sacredness of his calling, or is reminded of its sacred origin. It is the premium and the feast which tempt him. He sacrifices not to Ceres and the Terrestrial Jove, but to the infernal Plutus rather. By avarice and selfishness, and a grovelling habit, from which none of us is free, of regarding the soil as property, or the means of acquiring property chiefly, the landscape is deformed, husbandry is degraded with us, and the farmer leads the meanest of lives. He knows Nature but as a robber"

"Is it practicable, on the soil and in the climate of Massachusetts, to pursue a succession of crops? I cannot question it; and I have entire confidence in the improvements to our husbandry, and the other great advantages, which would accrue from judicious rotation of products. The capacities of the soil of Massachusetts are undoubted. One hundred bushels of corn to an acre have been repeatedly produced, and other crops in like abundance. But this will not effect the proper ends of a judicious and profitable agriculture, unless we can so manage our husbandry that, by a judicious and proper succession of the crops, land will not only be restored after an exhausting crop, but gradually enriched by cultivation."

"Now 'tis the spring, and weeds are shallow-rooted; Suffer them now, and they'll o'ergrow the garden And choke the herbs for want of husbandry."

"Neither a borrower nor a lender be; For loan oft loses both itself and friend, And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry. This above all: to thine ownself be true."

"There's husbandry in heaven; Their candles are all out."

"Let us suppose that, without forge or anvil, the instruments of husbandry had dropped from the heavens into the hands of savages, that these men had got the better of that mortal aversion they all have for constant labour; that they had learned to foretell their wants at so great a distance of time; that they had guessed exactly how they were to break the earth, commit their seed to it, and plant trees; that they had found out the art of grinding their corn, and improving by fermentation the juice of their grapes; all operations which we must allow them to have learned from the gods, since we cannot conceive how they should make such discoveries of themselves; after all these fine presents, what man would be mad enough to cultivate a field, that may be robbed by the first comer, man or beast, who takes a fancy to the produce of it. And would any man consent to spend his day in labour and fatigue, when the rewards of his labour and fatigue became more and more precarious in proportion to his want of them? In a word, how could this situation engage men to cultivate the earth, as long as it was not parcelled out among them, that is, as long as a state of nature subsisted."

"Perfection is a costly flower and is cultured only by an uncompromising, strict husbandry."

"But, poor old man, thou prunest a rotten tree, That cannot so much as a blossom yield In lieu of all thy pains and husbandry."

"Facts are stubborn things."

"Gustav Aschenbach was the writer who spoke for all those who work on the brink of exhaustion, who labor and are heavy-laden, who are worn out already but still stand upright, all those moralists of achievement who are slight of stature and scanty of resources, but who yet, by some ecstasy of the will and by wise husbandry, manage at least for a time to force their work into a semblance of greatness."

"In the time of Cato the Censor, the author of The Husbandry of the Ancients observed, though the operations of agriculture were generally performed by servants, yet the great men among the Roman continued to give particular attention to it, studied its improvement, and were very careful and exact in the management of nil their country affairs. This appears from the directions given them by this most attentive farmer. Those great men had both houses in town, and villas in the country; and, as they resided frequently in town, the management of their country affairs was committed to a or overseer. Now their attention to the culture of their land and to every other branch of husbandry, appears, from the directions given them how to behave upon their arrival from the city at their villas."

"When the land is cultivated entirely by the spade, and no horses are kept, a cow is kept for every three acres of land."

"If the national husbandry of this commonwealth be improved, we may hope, through god's blessing, to see better days, and be able to bear necessary and public burdens to more ease to ourselves, and benefit to human society, than hitherto we could attain to."

"When you have decided to purchase a farm, be careful not to buy rashly; do not spare your visits and be not content with a single tour of inspection. The more you go, the more will the place please you, if it be worth your attention. Give heed to the appearance of the neighbourhood, - a flourishing country should show its prosperity. "When you go in, look about, so that, when needs be, you can find your way out.""

"Let him sensibly perceive, that the kindness he shews to others, is no ill husbandry for himself; but that it brings a return in kindness both from those that receive it, and those who look on. Make this a contest among children, who shall out-do one another in this way: and by this means, by a constant practise, children having made it easy to themselves to part with what they have, good nature may be settled in them into a habit, and they may take pleasure, and pique themselves in being kind, liberal and civil, to others."

"What eie doth not pitty to see the great weaknes and decay of our ancient and common mother the earth, which now is grown so aged and stricken in yeares, and so wounded at the hart with the ploughman's goad, that she beginneth to faint under the husbandman's hand, and groaneth for the decay of her natural balsam. For whose good health and recovery, and for the better comfort of sundry simple and needy farmers of this land, I have partly undertaken these strange labours, altogether abhorring from my profession, that they might both know and practise some farther secrets in their husbandry, for the better manuring of their leane and barren groundes with some new sorts of marie not yet knowne, or not sufficiently regarded by the best experienced men of our daies.""

"Thaer's Principles of Agriculture, 2 vols. 4to. an excellent work. The author, though he never was in England, wrote on English husbandry so exactly that the board of agriculture in England sent him, by Mr. Sinclair, a patent as associate member of the Agricultural Society. He is a physician, but has now established a practical academy of husbandry near Berlin."

"Small herbs have grace, great weeds do grow apace."

"I will go root away The noisome weeds which without profit suck The soil's fertility from wholesome flowers."

"The summer's flower is to the summer sweet, Though to itself it only live and die, But if that flower with base infection meet, The basest weed outbraves his dignity; For sweetest things turn sourest by their deeds; Lilies that fester smell far worse than weeds."

"Nothing teems But hateful docks, rough thistles, kecksies, burs, Losing both beauty and utility."

"Now 'tis the spring, and weeds are shallow-rooted; Suffer them now, and they'll o'ergrow the garden And choke the herbs for want of husbandry."