48 



BULLETIN 341, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



veal calves. The owners called these beef cattle. These farms were 

 operated by men who had no help. The labor incomes on all of them 

 were very unsatisfactory. 



Twenty- seven farms were found on which steers were fed. The 

 percentage of receipts from steers on each of the 27 farms exceeds 20 

 on only 10 farms and 40 on 2 farms. Steer feeding is thus a busi- 

 ness little followed in this section. This of itself is an indication 

 that conditions are not generally favorable to the steer- feeding busi- 

 ness, especially when it is remembered that in the early days this 

 was a leading industry in Chester County. Its absence is not merely 

 due to lack of knowledge of the business, but to lack of economic 

 conditions favoring it. We have also seen that in the main this busi- 

 ness tends to gravitate to the larger farms. It appears especially on 

 those farms that are somewhat too large for one-man dairy farms, 

 and again more commonly on farms too large for two-man dairy 

 farms. It is an extensive system of farming. Ordinarily the profits 

 from it are so small that the small farmer can not well make a living 

 at it. It appears, however, to be a fairly satisfactory business on 

 large farms in this area. 



The relation between steer feeding and the resulting labor incomes 

 is shown in Table XXIV : 



Table XXIV. — Percentage of income from steers as related to laoor income. 





None. 



1 to 19. 



20+. 









351 

 101 



17 

 94 



10 





86 







Three hundred and fifty-one of the farms fed no steers and made 

 profits slightly greater than the average. The IT farms deriving 

 from 1 to 19 per cent of their income from steers made labor incomes 

 6 per cent below the average. The 10 farms deriving a larger share 

 of income from this source made labor incomes 14 per cent below the 

 average. These results, though based on rather meager data, are 

 consistent with those found in other surveys where small farms are 

 the rule. 



Sheep. — As previously stated, sheep were found on only 14 of these 

 farms. Six of them had flocks of breeding ewes numbering from 35 

 to 55 head. The others had only a few head each. The numbers are 

 too small to give very significant results in a comparison of labor 

 incomes on farms with and without sheep, but this fact of itself indi- 

 cates that these animals are poorly adapted to the conditions prevail- 

 ing here. The 364 farms having no sheep made labor incomes 1 per 

 cent above the average. Twelve farms deriving 1 to 19 per cent of 

 their income from sheep made labor incomes 26 per cent below, and 



