Note:  The following letter explains the two versions of the historical signs (text of signs follows the letter) posted to announce the University Bay agricultural field successes, written by Professor Jones (1931 or earlier).

                                                                                                            December 9, 1938

Mr. B. H. Roche

305 Agricultural Hall

Dear Mr. Roche:

     Herewith I am enclosing two copies each of the legends on “Marsh Reclamation”, one of which you expect to use for a new sign.  I am sorry I do not know which is the “new” one.  No doubt there is enough left of the sign board to identify it.

     At the time the last sign was made, Professor Jones wrote Mr. Haas, July 21, 1931, as follows:

     “I reproduced the copy that was on the old sign down on the marsh and have marked it “old”.  It consisted of about 350 words and the old board was 42 inches high by 31 inches wide.

     “I have also rewritten the legend and marked that copy “new”, but it contains about 500 words.  If it is necessary to make it shorter, you may cut out any of the paragraphs but the first one.  Perhaps a piece of the old board which is now in our Reading Room should be taken to the painter as a sample of the size of letters.  I would like to see the whole 500 words put on it.”

                                                                                                     Very truly yours,

                                                                                                     Gladys M. Quam

Enc.

cc to Mr. Haas

Before reclamation this field of 80 acres was as worthless for crop production as the floating peat bog east of the drive.   The soil is peat and typical of that on millions of acres of Wisconsin marshes.  While most of these marshes can be drained by gravity, this one had to be drained by an automatically controlled, electrically driven pump which lifts the water about nine feet into the lake at a power cost of a cent a day.  A system of the tile drainage collects the water from the soil and delivers it by gravity to the reservoir for pumping.

The drive serves as a dike to hold back the lake, which at normal level is more than a foot higher than the corn field.  Another dike around the area keeps off the surface water from the adjacent hills.  The seepage from the lake and hills and the rainfall on the area itself is all that the tile and pump have to remove.  This amounts to about 12 feet of water from 110 acres in a year.

The soil of this and other marshes is unbalanced in plant food, being high in nitrogen and low in potassium and phosphorus.  Without fertilizer treatment, their use is not profitable.  This is remedied generally by the application of commercial fertilizers containing only the needed elements, but in this field barnyard manure is used because of convenience.  Corn has been raised here every year since drainage.  The crop yield has averaged 17 tons of green ensilage or 70 bushels of corn to the acre annually.

This drainage was started in 1910 with open ditches, a small reservoir, and a gasoline engine for pumping.  It was not until 1914, however, when a group of students tiled one experimental acre thoroughly, and kept the gasoline engine running at intervals of two hours all night, that the land was made dry enough to plow.  After that the tile drainage was extended and the plant enlarged, until 1920 when the entire area had been covered by the system.  Meanwhile, electrical power had been substituted for ease of automatic control.

A disc plow is used for plowing; and a heavy roller to compact the soil.  A 4-row cultivator for the inter-cultivation has covered 55 acres a day.

The drainage of this land, even with the added expense of pumping, has been profitable because the University needed the land to raise the 800 tons of corn silage used annually on the farm.  It would not be profitable for the farmer unless land were scarce and he actually needed more tillable land to balance his farm operations. The tile drainage of wet spots and strips in and adjacent to cultivated fields is the type of drainage profitable on farms with a gravity outlet.  Such drainage straighten fields, makes cultivation easier, and reduces the cost of production.

 Note:  One of two historical signs developed to announce the University Bay agricultural field successes, written by Professor Jones before 1931.

     This marsh of 110 acres is characteristic of millions of acres of similar muck and peat marshes in this state.  Before reclamation the entire tract was as worthless for crop production as the adjoining peat bog seen at the right.  It needed drainage and certain fertilizers to convert it into productive lands.

     While most of the marsh lands of the state can be drained without pumping, this tract is drained by an automatically regulated electrically driven pump which lifts the water about nine feet and empties it into the lake.  The pump is operated at a cost of about a cent per acre per day.  Eighty acres of the marsh would be flooded by the lake except for the dike.  Another dike surrounds the marsh and keeps off the surface drainage from the surrounding fields and hills.  The underflow from the uplands, the rainfall on the surface, and the seepage from the lake are removed through a system of five to ten-inch drain tile discharging into the reservoir for pumping.

     The soils of such marshes as this are generally unbalanced, being very high in nitrogen, very low in potash, and often deficient in phosphorus. Without fertilizing treatment, their use is not usually profitable.  These defects are, however, easily removed by the application of manure or commercial fertilizers, supplying only the needed elements.  Detailed fertilizer experiments to study the need of this tract are in progress on a marked two-acre field south of this spot.

     Peat soils of this type should preferably be rolled to aid in conducting the sun’s heat downward.

     Suitable crops – hay, corn, buckwheat, rye, cabbage, and sugar beets can be grown successfully on these soils.

                   Crop  (  Hay-2 tons, alsike and timothy

                 Yields  (  Buckwheat-30 bushels, corn 12 tons ensilage

     The drainage of this land has been profitable because the University needed the land to raise the 800 tons of corn silage used annually on the farm.  It would not be profitable for the farmer unless he actually needed more tillable land to balance his farm operations.  The tile drainage of wet spots and strips in cultivated fields is always justifiable on the basis of cheaper production.

Note:  One of two historical signs developed to announce the University Bay agricultural field successes, written by Professor Jones before 1931.