would increase roughage on tillable land by 8.5 percent. Idle non-tillable 

 pasture probably is less than 17 percent of all non-tillable pasture so the 

 total production increase would be somewhat less than 8.5 percent. Moder- 

 ately heavy use of fertilizer and other recommended practices could result 

 in much higher production than the state average, but there is little reason 

 to assume these acres would be used more intensively than the average. 



It is commonly believed that in dairying, the chief agricultural use of 

 land in New Hampshire, roughage yields per acre are being greatly in- 

 creased. This, however, is only one of the important changes taking place 

 in dairy farming. Another is that the possible size of farm per man has ex- 

 panded, especially where modern field machinery can be used to an ad- 

 vantage. (Idle tillable land is meant to include only such land.) Some farm 

 management specialists take about 30 cows per man as a figure at which a 

 progressive young man might aim. Actually, in 1944 nearly 94 percent of 

 New Hampshire dairy farms milked less than 30 cows and about 75 per- 

 cent milked less than 20 cows. 1 Corresponding figures for New England were 

 85 and 65 percent. Herds of less than 30 cows were producing 83 percent of 

 the milk sold by New Hampshire dairy farms. Herds of less than 20 cows 

 were producing 51 percent of that sold. Informal observation in this study 

 indicated a strong tendency for small herds (say 5 to 10 cows) to have either 

 disappeared or (less frequently) become larger in the. period of 1938 to 

 1948. Herds of less than about 20 cows are probably too small to pay all 

 costs and furnish the farmer with a satisfactory income. 



The effect of these changes on the supply and price of milk and other 

 farm products would take place through a complicated series of adjustments 

 difficult to predict and describe except as to their general direction. If all 

 farms of less than 20 cows were to cease operation in, say, the next 10 years, 

 milk production could be maintained by higher production of the present 

 20 and over cow farms (through heavier use of fertilizer and heavier grain 

 feeding) and by a widening of the entire milkshed serving the Northeast. It 

 seems likely that higher milk .prices would be necessary to maintain the 

 supply by these means. 



There is a third alternative which may contribute to maintaining the 

 supply with less dependence on higher prices. Many small farms, some now 

 idle and some apt to become idle, have some resources, principally land, 

 suitable for farming. If this land can be made available, we may retain more 

 farms and more production in the New England area. We appear to be in 

 a situation of transition where small farms must grow or cease to operate 

 but where it is possible to use land farther from the farmstead in order to 

 build out a farm to adequate size. So, to avoid some unnecessary rise in the 

 cost of milk and of some other farm products, the public has an interest in 

 making available suitable land for farm use. 



The above paragraph indicates it probably would be uneconomic to 

 have some of this land out of agriculture. It should not be overlooked that 

 in some cases the process of taking small farms out of production may itself 

 be even more wasteful and should be avoided unless it is toward a highly 

 desirable end. If farmers are gradually forced off inadequate sized farms. 

 it means that in addition to undergoing personal hardships, they and their 

 equipment are being inefficiently employed and are contributing less to the 

 total product of society than they could if they had enough suitable land 



1 Calculated from unpublished sample data of the U. S. Census of Agriculture. 



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