STUDY OF FARMING IN SUMTER COUNTY, GEORGIA. 27 



The portion of the crop area devoted to these crops is fairly evenly 

 divided between first and second crop land. 



Few farmers in this region grow peanuts as a money crop. Only 

 enough seed is harvested for farm use; the rest of the crop is used 

 as feed for hogs, the hogs doing the harvesting. Peanuts give very 

 satisfactory returns as a feed and can be grown as a second crop 

 during the year. Less than 2 per cent of the crop area is devoted to 

 peanuts. 



Saccharine or sweet sorghum is used mainly as a forage crop. It 

 returns very satisfactory yields and a number of the farmers devote 

 small areas to it. 



Sugar cane, sweet potatoes, and watermelons are raised mainly for 

 farm and home use and occupy about 1 per cent of the crop area. 



| ENTERPRISES 



10 



PERCENTAGE OF TOTAL RECEIPTS 

 20 30 40 50 60 



TO 60 



COTTON 

 CORN 







"""" 





SMALL GRAIN 









HAY 



■ 







CANE SIRUP 



1 







SWEET POTATOES 



1 







MISCELLANE'S CROPS 



8 







INCREASE IN FEED 



1 







CATTLE 



1 







HORSES AND MULES 



1 







HOGS 









POULTRY 



1 







MISCELLANEOUS 



■ 







Fig. 5. — Proportion of farm receipts from different sources (160 white-owner 

 farms, Sumter County, Ga.). 



Many of these farms have an area devoted to growing garden veg- 

 etables and truck crops for use in the home and supplying hired labor. 

 The large amount of labor maintained on these farms makes the 

 growing of these crops quite essential. 



The owners devote a larger portion of the crop area to raising farm 

 feeds and home supplies than do the tenants. 



THE RELATION OF TENURE TO DISTRIBUTION OF FARM RECEIPTS. 



In Table VIII is shown the distribution of receipts on farms oper- 

 ated under the different classes of tenure. Figure 5 represents 

 graphically the percentage of distribution of farm receipts on the 

 white-owner farms. 



This table brings out clearly the importance of the cotton enterprise 

 in this region. On the farms worked by white operators the receipts 

 from cotton and seed alone range from 86.4 to 89.8 per cent of the 

 total for each tenure. In case of the farms worked by colored oper- 



