It requires time for people to assimilate the fact that the sombre terrain of brown grass standing on the ground in the winter season was a crop that could be depended upon ; that the short grass was not withered and worthless, but cured and ripened and equivalent to cured hay as fodder. As they came to understand the value of the grass for winter ranging, there came also a realization that the fodder produced by a blighted wheat or oats crop, if husbanded in season, was of much value as "roughing" to tide over the periods when snow covered the grass; and the art of averting a

HISTORY OF WESTERN NEBRASKA

crop failure was learned. It must be admitted that this is a semi-arid region, but the statement needs to be qualified ; in the spring time the precipitation is as sure as in the Missouri valley region. The dry weather comes, "if at all," in July and August. The agriculturist schooled in peculiarities of the climate remains "on the job" very closely in mid crop season. The abundant rainfall in spring and the fertility of the soil gives assurance of a crop equal to that of eastern Nebraska or Iowa up to the latter part of June, after which the rainfall is more uncertain, and then if drouth sets in to threaten the small grain or corn crop experience seems to have taught the grower not to gamble. A good fodder crop will repay the expense of seeding and harvesting, the steer in the grass pasture or the hog in the alfalfa patch will do the rest, and the season will be rounded out as a success, even though not a bushel of grain is threshed.