No. 4.] REPORT OF SECRETARY. xxix 



copies of all the publications of the Board displayed so as to be 

 easy of access to the public, and production charts showing the 

 localization of the various farm industries of the State. This 

 exhibit was shown in conjunction with that demonstrating the 

 commercial packing of apples in boxes, mentioned elsewhere. 



The Farm Catalogue. 

 The fact that the Legislature of 1912 failed to grant an 

 appropriation for a new edition of the farm catalogue, pub- 

 lished by this Board the previous year, has been a source of 

 very keen regret to your secretary. This regret has been in- 

 creased rather than diminished during the year by the numerous 

 and urgent calls for information in regard to available farm 

 lands in the State. Not only has the demand from this State 

 been incessant, but the calls from other States in the east, 

 in the middle west, and from the Pacific coast States have been 

 amazingly large. It is quite evident from these calls that the 

 relative status of agriculture in the west, in comparison with 

 the opportunities here in Massachusetts and New England, 

 is far below what it was some years ago. The fact that prac- 

 tically all of the free land of the west had been taken up several 

 years ago, and the further fact that land values are very ex- 

 cessive and irrigation must be practiced if satisfactory crops 

 are to be raised on some lands in the west, have caused the 

 people in those sections, and especially those who know the 

 conditions here in New England, to turn their attention back 

 to the east. INIassachusetts is very shortsighted, indeed, if 

 she does not make an effort to meet this call for her agricultural 

 lands, as well as to supply the call for information for available 

 farms from within her own borders and from other States 

 close at hand. There are but few copies of the edition of 10,000 

 copies printed in 1911 left for distribution, and indeed it is 

 hardly fitting that this information should be distributed as 

 authoritative or up-to-date, as many of the farms have since 

 been sold, while the owners of others, upon ascertaining the 

 demand for such land, have decided not to dispose of their 

 farms. A new list of available farms should be compiled, and 

 the information in regard to the status of agriculture in the 

 Commonwealth, which former editions of this publication have 



