200 Report of Fabmeks' Institutes 



FARM MANAGEMENT 

 Jaeed Van Wagenen, Jr. 



Farm management maj fairly be called one of the oldest of arts, 

 and yet one of the newest of sciences. As long as men have fol- 

 lowed the calling of the husbandman, each farmer has more or 

 less successfully dealt with the principles of farm management. 

 The first pastoralist proved himself a good farm manager when he 

 led his flocks where the pastures w^ere greenest; and our grand- 

 fathers on ISTew York State farms, perhaps less trained than we 

 in books and with less of wo-itten knowledge to guide them, were 

 nevertheless f ami manag'ers and ofttimes very successful ones. But 

 it is only within recent years that this new^ science has been so 

 developed that men have put its findings into books and that 

 certain principles have been proven by survey Avork and put into 

 teaching form. Let us emphasize the fact that we are not dealing 

 with anything fundamentally new. We are rather trying to 

 arrange and codify long established principles and farm traditions. 



I confess that it is not easy for me to define or limit the domain 

 belonging to this science. There is certainly not an agricultural 

 operation or practice which is not touched by it. For example, 

 the selection of a ration for a cow which shall enable her to give 

 the largest possible production of milk may be, taken solely by 

 itself, a question merely of animal husbandry, chemistry and nu- 

 trition; but, just as soon as you begin to consider matters of rela- 

 tive food costs or of markets, then farm management comes into 

 the problem. So crop rotation may be a practice controlled by 

 conssiderations of climate, soil adaptability, insect enemies and 

 plant diseases; but just as soon as we begin to consider one crop 

 in its relation to other crops so that there may not be interference 

 in planting or harvesting, or to plan so that there may be a suc- 

 cession of work throughout the season or that certain markets may 

 be supplied, . then we are dealing with factors of farm manage^ 

 ment. , 



Still, a brief discussion such as this certainly cannot cover the 

 entire field of agricultural practice, and it must draw a line some- 

 where. Let us say, then, that farm management concerns itself 



