--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Tanner, Joseph M. collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 11 number: 4 published: 1908-02 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: 'Joseph M. Tanner, "Thoughts of a Farmer—IV. By-Products," *Improvement Era* 11, no. 4 (February 1908): 279.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1104unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera1104unse start_page: 279 end_page: 279 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1908-02) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1104unse publication_year: 1908 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1908, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # Thoughts of a Farmer—IV. By-Products THOUGHTS OF A FARMER. BY DR. JOSEPH M. TANNER. IV —BY-PRODUCTS. In the great manufacturing industries of the world, the practice has grown up of putting to financial account what are commonly called the by-products, those trimmings and incidental accretions popularly known as waste. In the slaughter-yards, there are no longer wastes. In the cotton and woolen factories, everything is put to some account, and thus the by-products represent today many millions of dollars in the manufacturing world. The farmer has had to learn to put to valuable account the by-products of the farm, and hence there has grown up the term known as mixed farming. There is waste wheat and broken seeds for the chickens; he sometimes has frost-bitten grain for the pigs; and if his crop does not mature, it may make feed for his cattle. In short, he has learned in mixed farming to turn to good account that which might otherwise be a partial or even total loss. It is true, he relies upon a main crop, a crop from which he figures in the end his principal profits. He realizes, however, certain dangers, and he foresees a certain amount of waste against which he seeks to fortify himself by introducing some means of utilizing all the by-products of the farm. It not unfrequently happens that the by-products, after all, represent the real gain which comes from mixed farming. So it is in the affairs of our moral and intellectual natures. In college, we have our major and minor studies. In our social and family life, we have our grand ideals and common-place duties. They constitute a sort of mixed morals, so that no matter how grand a man's ideals are, no matter how wonderful his projects are, it often happens that the real gains to his moral nature come from the little things, the common-place duties of life. There are