The Midland Feed Region

W. H. Pierre and F. F. Riecken.

The Midland feed region, an area of about 220 million acres, extends from central Ohio to western Nebraska and from southwestern Missouri to central Minnesota.

It has 11.5 percent of the total land area of the United States and more than 34 percent of the total cropland. It produces more than two-thirds of our corn, oats, and soybeans and nearly one-half of our alfalfa. The value of the livestock in the region is about a third of the total of the entire country.

Most of the land in this productive region is level to gently rolling. The soils are generally medium to fine in texture. They have good structure and hold moisture well. They were formed chiefly from glacial and related soil material and are relatively young and productive. About 60 percent of the soil was formed under prairie vegetation. Being relatively high in organic matter and nitrogen, the soils have a high reservoir of fertility.

The rainfall in most of the Midland feed region is 30 to 40 inches annually. The west and northwest one-fourth receives about 22 to 30 inches, but this drier section gets about 75 percent of its total in April to September while crops are growing.

The growing season is long and warm and has about 180 frost-free days in the south and 140 frost-free days in the north. Only occasionally does corn fail to mature properly.

Corn, the crop of greatest overall economic advantage, is grown on more than 44 million acres. Oats, forages, soybeans, and wheat also are important.

The early systems of soil management in the region revolved largely around lime, legumes, and livestock. The idea was all right, but it was oversimplified and overgeneralized.

It had its greatest usefulness in the eastern part, where most soils are acid and relatively low in organic matter and nitrogen. Farmers in the western part recognized early that soil-management systems need to be directed more toward conservation and efficient utilization of moisture.

As soil-management systems have evolved in the region, however, the twin goals of the efficient and sustained production have been placed upon a broader base that of providing plant nutrients in amounts and kinds needed; control of the water by drainage or by conservation measures; improving organic matter and soil tilth; control of soil erosion; and a fuller integration of all needed soil- and crop-management practices for each kind of soil.

Among the major soil-management practices in the Midland feed region are: Tillage methods to develop suitable seedbeds and to control weeds; the use of legumes in the crop rotation and of manures and crop residue as sources of nitrogen and organic matter; drainage of wet soils; liming of acid soils; the use of commercial fertilizers for improvement of soil fertility; special practices for erosion control, such as stripcropping, contour tillage, and terracing; and the use of moisture conservation practices and supplemental irrigation to some extent.

Even the best established practices have been undergoing considerable changes in application because of mechanization and the changing agricultural pattern and because new facts have been discovered and a better understanding has been obtained of the suitability and value of various practices for different soils. Moreover, realization has grown that many practices must usually be combined into any soil-management system.

The proportion of the various crops varies in different parts of the region with climate, soil, or topography. That in turn affects the kind and amount of livestock, the type of farming, and the systems of soil management necessary for efficient and sustained production.

FIVE SUBREGIONS have been recognized in the Midland feed region on the basis of general differences in soils, climate, and type of farming.

Four of the subregions form approximately the area often referred to as the Corn Belt. They are the eastern forest subregion (EF), consisting mostly of northwestern Ohio and northern Indiana; the central prairie (P), mostly in northern Illinois, eastern and north-central Iowa, and south-central Minnesota; the southern prairie forest subregion (SP F), in northern Missouri and parts of adjoining States; and the western prairie belt (WP), mostly in Nebraska and South Dakota.

The fifth subregion, the northern forest (NF), lies to the north and includes primarily southern Michigan, southern Wisconsin, and southeastern Minnesota.

The soils of the forest subregions, formed largely under forest vegetation, are lighter in color and generally lower in organic matter and in bases than the soils in the prairie subregions.

The general topography of the Midland feed region is level to undulating, but gently rolling or hilly lands are extensive in several of the subregions, particularly in the southern prairie-forest subregion (SP F), the eastern part of the western prairie (WP), and the western part of the northern forest (NF) subregions. They are subject to serious erosion. They require special management.

Extensive areas of level soils that require artificial drainage exist in the central prairie, the eastern forest, and the northern forest subregions.

Most soils of the region are deep and have a medium to fine texture. They therefore can store water well. Sandy soils, however, with low soil moisture-holding capacity, are fairly extensive in the northern forest subregion and in parts of the eastern forest and western prairie subregions.

Significant differences exist in the climate of the subregions. In the northern forest belt, for example, the climate is cooler and the length of the growing season is shorter than in the other subregions. Largely as a result of this, corn loses its dominance and forage crops become more important than in the other subregions.

The highest annual summer rainfall (April September) is in the southern prairie-forest subregion in central Missouri, where it amounts to 26 inches. From there the rainfall drops gradually toward the north and east and rather rapidly to the west; it reaches a low of 17 inches in the western edge of the western prairie subregion. Moisture deficiency there is one of the serious limitations to corn production, and practices to conserve moisture and irrigation are much more important than in the other subregions.

THE CENTRAL PRAIRIE SUBREGION, approximately 40 million acres, is the heart of the Corn Belt and the Midland feed region. It consists of a nearly continuous area of level to gently rolling topography and extends from east-central Illinois to west-central Minnesota. It comprises nearly one-half of Illinois, more than one-half of Iowa, and about one-sixth of Minnesota.

The soils generally are the most productive in the region. Yields of corn averaged nearly 55 bushels an acre in the 1946-1955 period. More than one-third of the counties in the Illinois part of the area averaged slightly more than 60 bushels an acre.