The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1877-01-02
THE FARM AND HOUSEHOLD.
Farm Accounts.

We may with propriety say that all days
are alike, and give them all equal regard, and
yet there is manifest appropriateness in
attaching special significance to the opening
or closing of year. We look back upon
past time and finished work, and forward to
see what ought to be done if opportunity
Is offered. Men by common consent choose
this time for taking an account of stock, bal
ancing books and general adjustment of
accounts, and thus ascertaining their indi-
vidual standing and their relations to others.
While we doubt not that farmers as a
class are as systematic in business matters as
other men and as attentive to the settlement
OF accounts, we are apprehensive that as a
general rule they are neglectful Of their ac-
counts with their farms and ignorant of their
standing as farmers. 1t ought not to be nee
essary for an intelligent farmer to wait until
he hears casual remark from the passer-by,
or until the general average is made by his
agricultural society, or the county paper be-
fore he can tell whether or no he is a good
farmer. Every such man can decide the
question for himself, he alone is the proper
Judge, for he best knows his capacity and
opportunities and his real failures and sue
cess.
To arrive at correct conclusions about the
matter, it is indispensable that there should
be a well conceived plan of operations, a
systematic and effective execution of it, and
a careful examination OF results. Every one
who sells his own productions, is assisted in
making his computations by thus learning the
final resClt-the market-prce. But this is
not enough, profit or loss cannot be decided
from this factor alone, the great and abso-
lutely essential requisite is to know the cost
of production. In this respect farmers are
guilty of great negligence, and so rarely are
they in the habit of combining the items OF
expenditure in any given case, that an ex-
ceptional statement of the cost of some pro-
duction is always widely circulated and
generally commented upon. 1t is not unfre-
quently the case that some raiser of stock, or
farm or garden crops, makes large sales at
the regular markets and for the highest prices,
thus creating the impression that he is a
thriving and money-making man and possibly.
deceiving himself, when an investigation of
the facts would show that high prices paid for
fancy breeds, or imported fertilizers, had de-
stroyed all margin for profits. Such ilustra-
tions are not confined to the class of mere
theorists or fancy farmers. In the regular
round of country farm life it is not uncom
mon to find some man raising the same crop
that his father did and on the same soil. un-
mindful of the fact that the improved facili-
ties of transportation or the Introduction of
modern substitutes had removed from him all
possibilities of profit.
To prevent this selfdeception among our
readers, which is more widely spread than
we are hardly willing to believe or confess, is
our present object We earnestly advise all
careful and prudent farmers to avail them.
selves of the comparative leisure of the win
ter months and to devote a specific time
each day or week to the adjustment of their
farm accounts. Without indicating any def
mite system or method, it is enough to say
that every intelligent man can readily devise
some simple way of ascertaining whether his
labors in any or all departments of husbandry
have proved remunerative. If an examina-
ton in particular direction should show no
profit and he is unable to suggest amend
ments, he will of course resolve to discon-
tinue such unfortunate pursuits and earnest
ly devote himself to the discovery of some
more hopeful undertaking. A suitable ex-
ercise of courage enables us thus 10 detect
the cause of failure in the past and at the
same time to win success in the future.