Cost of Production, Yields, Profits 211 



turists, those who grow fruit and truck exclusively or 

 chiefly. 



Acreage. 



Some growers have the capacity to handle a hundred 

 acres ; others would fail with five acres. The strawberry 

 responds profitably to intensive culture until the law of 

 diminishing returns begins to operate. Intensive culture 

 is more practicable under some conditions, extensive 

 culture under others ; but if most growers would reduce 

 their acreage and cultivate it more intensively the yield 

 to the acre would be larger, and the cost of production 

 reduced. The desire for a large acreage has possessed 

 growers from the very beginning of commercial culture. 

 In 1880, J. R. Young, Jr., of Norfolk, Virginia, had 250 

 acres. Between 1885 and 1895, the rage for large fields 

 reached its height. One man in the Ozark district had 

 350 acres and fields of 150 to 200 acres were not uncommon. 

 Now the individual acreage is nearer ten than fifty, and 

 100-acre fields are uncommon. It is better for most 

 growers to have but ten acres of a fifty-acre farm in straw- 

 berries, and the remainder in other crops than to have 

 fifty acres of strawberries and be obliged to buy all the 

 hay and grain. 



The profits do not increase in proportion to the acreage, 

 as some have supposed. Beyond a certain point, the cost 

 of each cultural operation is greater, the difficulties of 

 securing efficient labor are more pronounced, the problem 

 of marketing is more involved and the yield to the acre is 

 smaller. It is not wise to double the acreage after a year 

 of good prices ; many other growers may do likewise. The 

 small grower, who does a large part of the work himself 

 and superintends all of it, will make the most profit to the 



