TENANCY IN THE NORTH ATLANTIC STATES 503 



dairying predominates. In the ten leading dairy counties of New 

 York, the average percentage of tenancy is 21, the same as for 

 the whole state ; but the tenants in these counties report 38 per 

 cent more than their proportional number of cows. The question 

 at once arises how these tenant dairymen accommodate themselves 

 to the short and uncertain tenure by which they hold the farms, 

 since it is not an easy matter to move the dairy equipment from 

 one farm to another without considerable loss in the process of 

 moving and readjusting. The answer is that these tenants do not 

 move as frequently as do other classes of tenants, and (what is not 

 the case in the greater part of the Middle West) when they do 

 move they have a reasonably good chance to find another farm 

 with accommodations for dairying. In many instances the relation 

 of landlord to tenant is much closer in this than in other types of 

 farming, the landlord frequently owning a share in the equipment 

 and paying part of the regular expenses, the arrangement being 

 analogous to a partnership. This higher percentage of tenancy in 

 the dairy business than in general farming is found in all of 

 the states of this group in which dairying is a leading business, 

 but not, for example, to a noticeable degree in Maine and New 

 Hampshire, where large dairies are few. 



With regard to live stock other than cows and hogs, the tenant 

 in the North Atlantic states, as in other parts of the country, has 

 less than his proportional share. As in the North Central states, 

 the tenants here raise relatively more hogs than do owners. It is 

 in dairying alone that an important exception in relation to tenancy 

 is apparent. Perhaps a word of caution may not be out of place. 

 A large proportion (probably 75 per cent) of the dairies are in the 

 hands of land-owning farmers ; but the general low rate of tenancy 

 in other lines gives the dairy tenant prominence. 



More important than in any other part of the United States 

 except the extreme West is the fruit farming of the North Atlantic 

 states, and in this fact lies a considerable part of the explanation 

 of the low rate of tenancy in this section. In the 1900 census 

 about one farm in sixteen in this group was classified as a fruit 

 farm, but this hardly gives an adequate picture of the situation, 

 since a very great deal of fruit must have been produced on other 



