N. H. Agr. Expeeiment Statiox 



[Bulletin 260 



LOCATION AND DESCRIPTION OF THE AREA STUDIED 



Location 



Grafton County is in the west central part of New Hampshire. Its 

 western boundary is the Connecticut River while its natural eastern 

 limit is roug'hly defined by the "White Mountains and their foothills. 

 The better automobile roads, as well as the railroads, follow the Con- 

 necticut, Mascoma, Baker's, and Ammonoosuc rivers, for the most part. 

 Along these rivers, also, the better appointed farms are likely to be 

 found. 



Area 



The land area of the county is approximately 1,106,560 acres, 31.4 

 per cent of which is in farms.^ Coos, embracing some 1,150,720 acres, is 

 the only county in the State having a larger land area. Grafton 

 County, however, exceeds each of the other nine counties of the State 

 in the area included in farms, 347,743 acres. The total farm land has 

 decreased here in recent years in common with the rest of the State. 

 The census figures indicate a decrease of 8.2 per cent for this county 

 between 1925 and 1930. In 1930, there were 2,077 farms in contrast to 

 2,698 reported for 1925, a decrease of 23 per cent. However, the farms 

 have increased in average size from 140.4 acres in 1925 to 167.3 in 1930. 

 This change of some 27 acres is probably significant. Some variation 

 probably results from combining farms to get a larger business in ac- 

 cordance with the economic requirements of present-day agriculture, 

 and possibly some from different instructions to enumerators. 



The 414 farms surveyed represented 19.9 per cent, or approximately 

 one-fifth, of the total number of farms in the county (Table 1) and 27.8 

 l)er cent, or more than one-fourth, of all the land in farms. The aver- 



Table I — A comparison of the area surveyed iritJi Grafton County as a uhole. 



Grafton 

 County.* 



Number of farms 2,077 



Average acres per farm 1G7.3 



Average acres in crops per farm 36.5 



Average value of land and buildings per 



farm $5,056 



Average value of land and buildings per 



acre $30.22 



Average value of buildings per farm $2,763 



Average value of buildings per acre $16.52 



Average value of land per farm $2,293 



Average value of land per acre $13.70 



Average number of cows per farm 7.1 



15.9 



222.5 



* Fifteenth Census of the United States, Agriculture, 1930. 



