266 FLORIDA GEOLOGICAL SUR\-EY I3TH ANNUAL REPORT 



CONDITIONS IN I9O9-IO 



The federal census of 19 lo, supplemented by a special report 

 on- negro population published late in 1918, affords enough mate- 

 rial for several tables, one for all farmers as before and two for 

 whites and negroes separately, besides some for crop values, crop 

 yields, and animal products. Statistics of a few kinds, for owners, 

 managers and tenants separateh^ could also have been compiled 

 from the same returns if it had seemed worth while. 



The blanks near the top of the first table are due to lack of 

 correspondence between natural boundaries and county bounda- 

 ries, as before. In the negro population volume the returns 

 from counties with less than 100 negro farmers are less complete 

 that the others, so that some blanks had to be left in one of the 

 tables for that reason. 



As these are the most complete agricultural statistics available 

 at this writing, they will be used to illustrate some general princi- 

 ples which have been passed over rather hurriedly in discussing the 

 earlier censuses. 



The percentages of farm land and improved land are doubt- 

 less highest in the most fertile region, the Middle Florida ham- 

 mock belt, though there are no statistics to show it. because it cov- 

 ers only a fraction of one county. The nmn^ber of improved acres 

 per inhabitant is highest and the number of inhabitants per farm 

 lowest in the Gulf hammock region (if Sumter County is a fair 

 representative of it), indicating that agriculture is most important 

 (relative to other industries) there, though the hammock belt 

 would doubtless lead in this respect too if it did not contain the 

 city of Ocala. The other extreme is in Hillsborough County, 

 which contains the largest city. 



The largest farms are in the eastern flatwoods, where there is 

 a superabundance of "elbow room," but five-sixths of their area 

 there is unimproved, mostly cattle range. The lime-sink region, 

 where land is cheapest (and easy to cultivate), has the most im- 

 proved acres per farm.* The east coast strip .represents the other 



*Conditions there resemble those in the Mississippi Valley in that low ex- 

 penditures and returns per acre are compensated for by the cultivation of a 

 large number of acres per farm; this being c.vtensiz'e as opposed to intensive 

 farming. 



