PART IX 



Farm Statistics for the Year Ending December 31, 1922, 



Collected by Township Assessors and Tabulated 



by the Iowa Weather and Crop Service 



Better work by the assessors as a whole, through closer contact with 

 the central office of the Iowa Weather and Crop Service in Des Moines 

 made it possible to do 60 per cent more work by shifting only 13 per cent 

 more money into miscellaneous clerk hire from other funds. Twenty- 

 three more counties were handled direct from the assessors this year, 

 leaving only 32 counties tabulated voluntarily by county auditors without 

 compensation or authority of law. 



A few hundred dollars more would complete the direct contact with the 

 assessors, increase the accuracy of the statistics, and expedite their pub- 

 lication. It is expected that the published bulletin containing these sta- 

 tistics will be ready for distribution early in July, nearly 30 days earlier 

 than last year. If all assessors reported direct instead of through county 

 auditors, nearly 30 days more could be saved. 



Total farms in Iowa in 1922, 213,021, are 1,075 less than last year, but 

 this apparent decrease is due to a new ruling as to listing of township 

 boundary line farms. Heretofore, township boundaries have been rigidly 

 observed, with the result that a farm operated under one management but 

 lying in two townships was reported as two farms, a portion being re- 

 ported by each assessor. This year, as a rule, all land operated under 

 one management was listed as one farm. This agrees with the method 

 used by the government census, which* found 213,439 farms including 

 small areas producing $250 or requiring the continuous services of at 

 least one person. The assessors enumerate only farms of 3 acres or more. 



The total acres in farms reported by assessors was 33,528,154 which is 

 109,782 acres more than last year and 53,258 more than the last govern- 

 ment census. This speaks well for the efficiency of the assessors. Some 

 of the increase is no doubt due to the improvement of wild and rough 

 lands. Allowing 547,000 acres for cities, towns and railroad right-of-way, 

 there remains unaccounted for in Iowa 1,705,000 acres. This includes the 

 larger rivers and flood plains along them, wooded areas not in farms, 

 state parks, mines, quarries, lakes, sloughs, and exceedingly rough areas, 

 none of which are within the deeded areas of farms. 



Corn acreage, 10,364,163, is 139,176 acres larger than in 1921 and next 

 to the largest of record. Oats acreage, 5,874,172, is 464,623 acres less 

 than last year. Some of the more notable increases in acreages in addi- 

 tion to corn are as follows: Winter wheat, 199,971; tame hay, 175,923; 

 barley, 28,909; rye for grain, 16,827; timothy seed, 35,907; and orchards, 

 9,629. Waste land in farms increased 13,908 acres, due mostly to over- 



