5l8 READINGS IN RURAL ECONOMICS 



price, in order that he may have a supply for feeding stock, and 

 also in order to keep his land in better condition than it would be 

 with small-grain growing ; but these cases are surely not very 

 common. The tenant is the type of farmer to prefer the extensive i 

 to the intensive system of farming. In the northwestern part of 

 this section, where corn has not proved a profitable crop, and yet 

 where land has advanced rapidly in price, the tenant farmer is a 

 wheat grower. This may be seen on the map if the wheat sec- 

 tion of the Red River valley be kept in mind, for over a con- 

 siderable portion of this valley the tenancy shading is noticeably 

 dark. These are the two sections, the corn and the wheat areas 

 blending into each other, in which a simple exploitative system 

 of farming is possible. Here tenancy is not only high, but is 

 on the increase at a rapid rate. Around the outside of this 

 great area there is not the opportunity to plant and reap on a 

 wholesale plan. 



There is a great difference between the eastern and southern 

 parts of Ohio and the rest of the state in respect to soil and to- 

 pography, and the line of the division shows plainly on the ten- 

 ancy map. In the southern and eastern portion, with its hilly 

 land, wheat and corn are not grown in great quantities. It is here 

 that sheep raising and dairying are common, neither of which 

 businesses predominates amongst tenants. These businesses are 

 not adapted to the ability of the tenant; the soil is not adapted 

 to the crops which he prefers. It seems that a diversified type of 

 farming is all but inevitable in a district of this kind. Again, this 

 is not the land to rise in price as does the richer and smoother 

 land, and so does not get beyond the reach of the farmer in price 

 per acre. The advantage of the large holding is less than in the 

 case of land adapted to the growing of grain, thus contributing 

 another factor toward keeping the value of the farm unit from 

 rising too high for the farmer of moderate fortune. In Michigan, 

 where tenancy is low, farming is diversified. Fruit growing is 

 prevalent, in some counties great quantities of potatoes are raised ; 

 dairying and sheep raising predominate in others. All of these 

 facts apply to Wisconsin, which among the older states has a lower 

 rate of tenancy than any other in the Middle West. Wisconsin 



