The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1871-02-02
THE REPORT ON AGRICULTURE.
From the Chicago Tribune

/ tiHdpS TIC HloSt Important, ana GER
tainly the most instructive, of the annua
reports is that of the Commissioner of
Agriculture. Two hundred and twenty
| five thousand extra copies of the report
for 1869 are now passing into the hands
of the people under the frank of our
Senators and representatives 1t is not
easy to make either an abstract or an es-
innate of a volume of 702 pages, prepared
| by eight specialists, each of whom has
aimed to make his own report con
densation OF his subject. Commissioner Ca
prom states that rapid progress is making,
| through the agricultural press and col
| leges, in raising the standard of intellect
among farmers he thinks the wool raisers
have been benefited by the present tariff
on wools.-which shows that the standard
of intellect among Commissioners of
| Agriculture ought to be raised refers
to the cotton crop of the past year as
| yielding the largest amount of m ney
OF any ever produced says that the
cotton manufactures are spreading at the
South and thai the American mills,
which IN 1850 consumed 20 per cent, now
consumes 40 per cent of our crop. The
| cultivation of sugar, vineyards and nran
| ges ut the South Is resunliug its former
success, and is attended by the introduce
tion of improved implements, fertilizers,
and higher standard of agricultural
reading among the planters. THE con.
tinuous planting of the new lands of the
West with wheat" says the Commits
sloner, +" IS removing. westward, year by
year, the centre OF wheat production, and
increasing the distance of transportation
while the railroads, by their combina-
tions and advance of tolls to secure divi-
dends upon watered stock, are increas-
ing in equal ratio the cost of freights.' y
The remedy, he thinks, lies in greater
Investigation of industry, and in an
abandonment of the skinning and
superficial system OF agrleulture' We
think we have heard something of this
before; but why don t the industries .'di-
yerslfyg And how are farmers to prac-
tice the more costly systems of farming,
when they can scarcely pay for the little
labor required in the cheaper. Mr. Ca,
prom thinks there is very little to be made
as rule, by holding lands
tor q rise in value; and, in support of
this, he publishes table wherein the in
crease in assessed value per annum of all
the lands in the United States, for the
ten years from 1850 to 1860, is given
Figures as old as those have no business
In an Agricultural Commissioners report
for 1869. ae
4 The department has distributed 311..
500 packages Of seeds. mostly to mem
bers OF Congress, and the Commissioner
INDUCES in the lively faith that some OF
them have " come up" and brought forth
some twenty fold, some fifty-fold. and
some one hundred-fod We hope 50,
for they have gained a good many farm,
ers' votes, and we have known some
farmers so tlckled at receiving this
recognition from their NJ Cs that thew
thought the seed altogether too valuab. e
to plant and kept them as a certificate
Of their own political importance.
4 The report OF the statistican, Mr.. j. r
i Dodge, informs Us chat the total value of
all the cereals, with hay, cotton and to-
bacco is $780, 179, S43, or about one.
tenth Of the whole value of the real estate,
Corn amounts to the largest aggregate,
Wis. $658, $50, 700 and then follows hay,
1887, 662, 600 cotton, S303, 600, 900 wheat
$247 ,O99, 100; and oats, $137,347,OOO.
The relative values of the weld per
acre, as effected by prevailing prices,
stand in the following order: Tobacco,
potatoes, cotton, barley, hay, corn, buck
wheat, oats, rye, wheat.
Vermont raises the greatest average
value IN corn per acre, viz $47,6O. New
Hampshire is first in value per acre Of
wheat and Connecticut in that of tobac.
co, her average yield being 1891 per acre.
Kansas, in 1869 yielded the largest aver
age crop per acre of corn, viz 49, bush
els; Georgia yielding the smallest Ii
bushels. Oregon yielded the largest aver
age per acre of wheat, viz: 10 bushels /;
Kansas being 18 3 bushels, California
1872, and Vermont and Massachusetts IS
The State yielding the smallest average
per acre IN wheat was S )uth Carolina.
6. bushels; the next in order being
Georgia, IA Alabama, 10; North Caro-.
lima, 81 Tennessee, 8.4 and Mississippi,
9. bushels Kansas yields the largest
average crop of oats 42.1 bushels; Cali
cornla the largest of rye 81 S bushels !;
also of barley, 1878. North Carolina,
strange to say, is set down for the largest
average yield per acre of buck wheat, 80 Q
bushels while Virginia produces only
third of that crop, and Tennessee only a
fifth. In potatoes Vermont produces the
highest average yield per acre, 100 bush
els; New Hampshire, 800 Michigan,
1856; and Kansas, l49 We may, perhaps,
ascribe the large yield in Vermont and
| New Hampshire to the fact that TIE acres
are SO uneven that they can plant often
ten or twelve more rows of potatoes on
an acre than if it were level. That is a
sharp way the New Englanders have of
cheating the surveyor. In tobacco the
largest average crop is raised in Connecti
cut, 1850 pounds per acre, and the small