The Relation of Capital to Type of Farm Most farmers begin business with a small capital and gradually increase as they save money. With small capital one must economize on the less essential things. Usually land, horses and machinery are the essentials, so that the man with small capital is likely to have fewer producing livestock and sell more crops than he will when his capital increases. As capital increases, not only does he increase the number of livestock but he improves their quality.
Type of Farming and In nearly every region there are one or two crops or classes of animals that are much more profitable than others. Usually it pays a farmer to use his available labor and equipment to produce the maximum amount of these products. But other crops can be grown at periods when the most profitable crop does not demand attention. It therefore pays to fill in the time with these less profitable enterprises. In the South, the tustom is to grow all the cotton that can be handled, but it pays to fill out with less profit able crops so that one has a diversified farm. In the corn belt the maximum area of corn is grown, but it pays to fill out the season with bats, hay and other less profitable enterprises so as to provide a full year's work.
Intensity of In order to com pare farms as to the livestock enterprises, it is necessary to reduce all animals to a comparable unit. One horse or cow is called an animal unit. Seven sheep, five hogs, or 100 hens are each called an animal unit. In each case twice as many young stock are required. In some of the most intensive dairy regions there are less than two acres of harvested crops per animal unit. In some parts of the wheat regions of the Northwest there are as high as 13 acres of crops per animal unit. In the cotton belt six acres is very common. In most parts of the United States the number is from two to seven acres of crops per animal unit. Regions that have three acres or less of crops per animal unit may be said to be heavily stocked, regions with four or more acres of crops are lightly stocked.
An animal unit produces about one ton of manure per month. If the animalsare in the barn half of the time, six tons of manure will be available per animal unit. In many parts of the North as high as eight tons are com monly recovered for use on crop land. In the
South the animals are in the barn so little that only a small amount of manure is recovered. If six tons are recovered per animal unit, and if there are three acres of crops per animal unit, then there will be two tons of manure for each acre of crops each year. An application of 10 tons per acre could therefore be made every five years. Similarly, if there are six acres per animal unit only 10 tons per acre could be applied every 10 years. Under this condition many parts of the farm are likely not to be manured at all.
When manure is spread by hand it is usually applied at the rate of 15 to 30 tons per acre. It is therefore evident that only on the most heavily stocked farms will the entire farm re ceive manure. But with a manure spreader, and by making applications of 5 to 10 tons, the entire farm can be regularly manured in most regions of the North and east of the arid region.
Timeliness in Probably no other industry calls for such frequent changes in plans. The problem of timeliness is, therefore, much more difficult than in most industries. A farmer may plan to harvest crops, but a rain comes up and he changes to inside work. The storm seems to be over and he starts out to fix a road, but the rain comes on again and prom ises to be a rainy day. He then gives up and goes to town to get machinery repaired and do trading.
Some farm operations, such as driving fence posts, require that the soil be very wet to work to the best advantage. Other operations, like plowing, require that it be moist but not wet. Plowing can be done when it is too wet to cultivate, harrow, or plant. Other operations, such as harvesting, require dry weather. In most regions the greatest problem is to get the dry weather work done. The different fields also differ in their characteristics. One must plow and plant the fields when he has a chance. The best drained land can be used for the times when the wet land cannot be worked. The decision as to when to be doing a particu lar piece of work is of great importance. The morning may start out wet and one may start doing one of the wet weather jobs but it may clear suddenly and demand a change before noon.