Three things are needed to grow rice: warm climate, an abundance of water, and rich soil. This means that in the United States it is grown near the coast or in the river valleys of certain of our southern states. Louisiana, Texas, Arkansas, South Carolina, and Mississippi grow nearly all the rice raised in our country. It is sowed in drills with the rows wide enough apart to allow the young plants to be cultivated. Its cultivation is quite different from other small grains. This is because rice is naturally a water plant. It must therefore be sowed in fields that can be irrigated. In Louisiana and Texas these irrigation plants cost thousands of dollars. Concrete reservoirs in some places have been built so that the water can be let out over the fields as needed. But the usual method

is to pump the water directly from a river or a bayou into large mains. From these mains small pipes lead to individual plantations. The water plant may be owned by a company of farmers, or it may be controlled by a company that sells the water at so much a cubic foot to the farmers who use it. When the field is dry hoeing begins. Grass, weeds, and wild rice are carefully destroyed. On progressive plantations the horse hoe has displaced the hand hoe. A second hoeing is made about ten days after the first. The field remains without irrigation until jointing begins. It is then hoed slightly and very carefully so as not to injure the plants. Then the water is turned on again. The water is changed every week so that it will not become stagnant