10 REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE. 



1880, the value of meats increased from $300,000,000 to $800,000,000; 

 of corn, from $360,080,878 to $094,818,304 ; of wheat, from $124,G35,545 

 to $430,908,403 ; of hay, from $152,071,108 to $409,505-,783 ; of dairy 

 products, from $152,350,000 to $352,500,000; of cotton, from $211,510,025 

 to $271,G36,121, and other products in proportion, more than doubling 

 the aggregate of value, increasing it from $1,000,000,000 to $3,000,000,000 

 in round numbers. With good prices the current production of the 

 agriculture of the United States can be little short of four billions of 

 dollars ; and the values are those of the home markets, and not of the 

 eastern commercial cities or ports of exportation. 



The investigations of the past year show a tendency to farther in- 

 crease of the area of corn and cotton and of most of the principal crops 

 of the country. The wheat area is so much beyond the requirements 

 of consumption in this and other countries as to depress the price to a 

 point unprecedented in recent years, favoring at certain points the use 

 of wheat in feeding for pork production. The cause of this super- 

 abundance is two-fold — first, the extension of settlement in the north- 

 western prairies and the dry plains of the Pacific coast; and, second, 

 the extraordinary period of comparative failure of European wheat for 

 several consecutive years. The progress of settlement must be less 

 rapid hereafter, and already the lean years of Europe have been fol- 

 lowed by, comparative plenty. 



These facts of products and prices point to the sharp necessity of 

 adapting production to consumption, to supply food products now im- 

 ported, to give remunerative employment to agricultural labor and food 

 in variety, and cheapness to consumers. 



The present year's history of crop growth, in the records of this Bu- 

 reau of the statistics of agriculture, indicates a production above the 

 average, a season of peculiar prosperity, with no serious failures. 

 Drought alone, in a portion of the producing area, has wrought some 

 reduction of the rate of yield. The cotton crop has been somewhat in- 

 jured by this cause, yet the crop promises nearly 0,000,000 bales. Corn 

 apparently averages about 20 bushels per acre, which is about the 

 average of the prior period of ten years, giving a crop not heretofore 

 exceeded in absolute quantity. Wheat has made a yield of fully 13 

 bushels per acre, and a product exceeding 500,000,000. The supply of 

 cereals will average fully 50 bushels for each inhabitant. Potatoes of 

 both kinds are fairly abundant, and other products generally in full 

 supply. Altogether, the year is one of positive, if not exceptional, 

 fatness. 



This Bureau has been active during the year in the work of collecting 

 and co-ordinating the official statistics of State departments, boards of 

 agriculture, and of commercial organizations, and exploring the domain 

 of fact in all departments of agricultural effort and experiment. In 

 addition to the work of our duplicate system of domestic crop -report- 

 ing, the effort to obtain early information of European crop production 



