1 78 AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS 



is suitable for winter grazing only, being largely covered with a heavy 

 growth of sagebrush and dry-land grasses, but without a supply of 

 water for stock during the summer months. The melting snows and 

 spring rains supply the needed moisture to produce a good growth of 

 grass over all of this region, but the lack of water for stock saves the 

 grass and forage until the snowfall of winter provides the needed 

 moisture for cattle and sheep, and the grass then provides the winter 

 feed for thousands of animals. During the summer months stock of 

 all kinds seek the green grass and pure spring water of the high 

 mountain ranges with which the state is so liberally provided. Grass 

 and forage in the mountains, when the snowfall is deep, grow rapidly 

 and provide great quantities of feed year after year on the same range. 



NOTE. This is merely a typical bit of what is true over consider- 

 able areas in our highland regions, both east and west. New England 

 land that was too rough for the plow reverted to sheep pastures and 

 horse farms as soon as the competition of western lands became active. 

 Similarly, New York has become our leading dairy state, and from the 

 Adirondacks south to Alabama the rough lands of the Appalachian 

 region are destined apparently to produce, at least for a long time to 

 come, only such product as can be secured from pastoral farming. Of 

 course, in many places orcharding competes with or supplements 

 stock raising and, as population becomes more dense, there is a strong 

 tendency to introduce more intensive types of farming on the small 

 plateaus or in even the tiniest of level valleys. There is also the 

 tendency to carry agriculture farther by resorting to terracing as a 

 means of extending permanent cultivation to the less level lands. 

 Among the teeming population of the Orient this effort is carried to 

 the extreme, and terraced hillsides whose natural slope is nearly or 

 quite forty-five degrees are cultivated in narrow strips by hand labor. 

 Travelers report that some of the rice-paddies are but a few feet in 

 diameter. 



An interesting phase of pastoral farming in a mountainous region 



is to be seen in Switzerland. The peasants maintain their permanent 



homes in the valleys, where they stable and feed their stock through 



the winter, often combining some light form of household manufac- 



\vith their other tasks during the indoor season. With the 



; of spring, flocks and herds are driven into the foothills or 



Voralp, and after a few weeks up to the Hochalp, as far as the margin 



of perpetual snow. From this summer grazing they return to the 



Voralp for a few weeks in the fall and then are driven down to the 



vallrys for winter housing. 



