14 University of New Hampshire [Sta. Bull. 322 



Table III. — Combinations of land and labor to produce the equivalent 



of one ton of hay 



(Assuming three tons silage are equivalent to one ton hay) 



Acres of Hours of Hours of 



land man labor horse labor 



Farm X 



Silage .3 7.3 16 



Hay .84 6.1 6 



Farm Y 



Silage .3 19 16 



Hay .57 10 9 



Since there is no better productive opportunity for the use of 

 available labor and teams in the spring and fall, silage production is 

 a good practice on the two farms in spite of the fact that nu)re total 

 man and horse hours are required per feed unit. 



On the basis of a definite wage scale and allocation of all over- 

 head, hay would nrobably represent a cheaper form of roughage on 

 these farms, but the i)roduction of the combination of one acre of 

 silage to five acres of hay uses the available man and horse labor to 

 better advantage and results in greater total feed units. Silos and 

 silo machinery were available on these farms. 



Oats 



An average of 5.8 acres of oats was grown per farm. All opera- 

 tors grew oats and most of them threshed all or part of the crop. 

 On most farms in the area oats are cut for hay when roughage is 

 short and harvested for grain when roughage is ]^lentiful. This crop 

 is used as part of the process of reseeding and llu' time reciuirnl is 

 more or less a joint production factor with hay production. The 

 process results in more and better hay and is ,a factor in keeping up 

 the yielding capacity of the fields. The labor on oats is not season- 

 ally competitive with other produclii ni. However, the labor retjuire- 

 mcnt for harvesting and threshing is especially high and the opera- 

 tors can well consider changing their ])resent i)ractices. 



Manure Hauling 



The handling and spreading of manure is an important item of 

 labor expense and is, to a large extent, part of the process of pro- 

 ducing milk. On the average. 252 man hours and 286 horse liours 

 were required per farm in getting the manure distril)ute(l. Since 

 there is some leeway as to the time of this operation, the labor re- 

 cpiired can be fitted into slack periods. On individual farms the la- 

 l)or requirement varied from .5 to .3.5 man hours per ton. A few nf 

 the men bandied the manure a number of times, hauling it to ihe 

 fields in carts, distributing into small piles and then scattering by 

 hand forks. Some hauled directly from the barns to the fields in 

 maiuire s])reader. .\ few haided to large field piles in the winter 

 anfl then used manure sjireader for clistribulion in the spring. While 

 this method requires more total hours and an e.xtra handling, less 

 time is needed in the rush period of spring. 



