FOURTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK — PART XII. 695 



The live stock exhibit was smaller than usual, owing to the heavy 

 rains making the roads almost impassable and preventing bringing in 

 stock from the country. 



Exhibits in vegetables and grain were especially good, and that of 

 fruit was far above the average. 



Favorable weather the last week in September put the corn crop in 

 better condition than anticipated, but the yield and quality will not be up 

 to the average. 



Oats did very well on high well drained land, but on the low lying 

 land did not average more than ten bushels per acre. 



There was a good yield of potatoes, and were generally of a good 

 quality, with but few reports of rotting. 



Pasturage and hay being abundant made dairying a very profitable 

 industry this season. 



Land values are unchanged in this locality, farms selling at from 

 $50 to $80 per acre, but very few transfers. 



HARDIN COUNTY. 



0. E. Greefe. 



The thirty-third annual exhibition of the Hardin County Agricultural 

 Society was held at Eldora, September 1, 2, 3 and 4, 1903. The 

 weather was as favorable for a good fair week as any person could ask 

 for. Lists of entries, through the special effort of the secretary, were 

 filed for the record fully six weeks before the date of the fair. This 

 feature made the work of entering easy for one person, although our total 

 entries were over twenty-two hundred, which was fully 50 per cent more 

 in numbers than the books of the society show as ever having been made 

 before. While this feature was gratifying, its one drawback lies in the 

 fact that the expense was also greatly increased in the payment of the 

 added premiums on the proportionally larger classes filled. The display 

 of cattle generally was of a high class, and our swine, in numbers, far 

 exceeded our former pen capacity, and in quality were never better. 

 Our poultry houses were very well filled with many varieties. Farm 

 products, owing to the unusually wet season, were not especially large. 

 Fruits of the varieties grown in Iowa were shown in abundance and were 

 of very good quality. Our special corn exhibit proved a failure, owing 

 largely to the fact discovered too late that this feature must generally be 

 considered and treated as a December or January show, as not many 

 times in a score of years could it possibly be a practical exhibition so 

 early in the season. 



Our receipts were larger than ever before, attendance numbering 

 about six thousand persons on Wednesday, thirteen thousand on Thurs- 

 day and about seven thousand on Friday. Our privileges were vrell sold 

 and free attractions were of a pleasing kind, and the entire fair was of a 

 clean moral nature and no complaint was heard. 



