10 



INFLUENCE OF DAIRYING 



The remarkable growth of large and small cities thruout this 

 fertile section resulted in a corresponding demand for milk and 

 butter. This could be met only by the establishment of dairy 

 farms within comparatively short distances from the cities and 

 an increased production of dairy products on general farms; 

 whereas the supply of beef could readily be secured from 

 greater distances, especially in view of the increasing beef pro- 

 duction of the range country at this time. 



Table 2 shows -the actual number of milch cows and also the 

 proportion of milch cows to total cattle in the corn-belt states by 

 twenty-year periods since 1870, including 1913. 



TABLE 2. NUMBER OF MILCH Cows IN THE CORN-BELT STATES 



1 U. S. Dept. of Agr., Bur. An. Indus., Ann. Kept. 1897, pp. 267-289. 



2 U. S. Dept. of Agr., Yearbook 1909, p. 572. 



3 U. S. Dept. of Agr., Yearbook 1912, p. 682. 



Passing from the eastern to the western states of the corn 

 belt, the percentages in the right-hand column show a remark- 

 ably uniform decrease in the proportion of milch cows. Approx- 

 imately one-half of the cattle of Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois are 

 classified as milch cows, while only about one-fourth of those of 

 Kansas and Nebraska are so classified. 



As in the case of beef cattle, the increase in the number of 

 milch cows has been much less marked during the last twenty 

 years than in the previous period, owing to the less pronounced 

 changes in population and industrial development. The slight 

 increase in the proportion of milch cows to the total number of 

 cattle in Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois during forty years does not 



