FARMING IN THE LOWER RIO ORANDE DISTRICT. 3 



where natural drainage is not exceptionally good artificial drainage 

 must be provided where irrigation is practiced extensively. 



The soils of the region are generally alluvial in origin and are 

 exceedingly varied in character. There are low-lying areas that are 

 poorly drained and are permeated with alkali, but the greater por- 

 tion of the land is fertile and produces good crops when proper cul- 

 tural methods are followed. 



FARM FACTS. 



During 1914—15 the writer visited several hundred farms in the 

 lower Rio Grande district and secured information from the farmers 

 themselves relating to the farm enterprises. The following pages 

 give some data from the detailed study of these enterprises as well as 

 of the entire business of 59 farms of the region, distributed from a 

 point below Brownsville to a point north of Mission, a distance of 

 about 70 miles. These farms are classified according to type as 

 follows : Twenty-six truck farms, 16 stock farms, and 17 staple crop 

 farms. 



SIZE OF FARMS. 



The farms studied vary in size from 10 acres of crop land to 200 

 acres, with an average of 59 acres, or 73 acres of total farm area. The 

 area of crop land in this region does not always measure the size of 

 the business on account of the difference in intensity of the various 

 types of farms. When total expenses are used as a measure of size 

 it is found that while staple crop farms average 87 acres as compared 

 with 63 acres for truck farms, the expenses of operation Of the truck 

 farms are nearly $1,000 greater per year than those for staple crop 

 farms. 



Fig. 3. — A lateral irrigation ditch on a farm. The ditches are sometimes plowed down 

 and reconstructed annually in place of cleaning them. Lettuce borders this lateral. 



