REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE. 



9 



thermometer will average as high a range as in strictly tropical coun- 

 tries. This tropical period lengthens as we proceed southward, until 

 Southern Florida is reached, where it extends to about eleven months 

 out of the twelve which constitute the year. But this period, more 

 or less, of cool weather, liable to an occasional freeze, is sufficient to 

 to destroy all vegetation which is strictly tropical in its nature. It is 

 therefore only by experimental tests that the adaptability of plants to 

 climates or locations other than their native ones can be truly demon- 

 strated. With this view, it is proposed to continue the introduction, 

 as far as practicable, of all plants whose economic value entitle them 

 to recognition. 



BUREAU OF STATISTICS. 



With the increase of area in cultivation and of variety in production 

 the work of collecting statistics of agriculture in this country is con- 

 stantly enlarging. The rapidity of agricultural progress and the local 

 irregularities of its movement tend to increase its difficulty and dimin- 

 ish its accuracy 5 on the other hand, a growing public appreciation of 

 its importance is a means of higher efficiency, as well as its surest 

 guarantee. 



The field work of this branch of the department service is obviously 

 a matter of observation, comparison, and estimate, and not an actual 

 count of a census. The swift changes of the alternating seasons must 

 be summed up with instant celerity; their effects on ultimate produc- 

 tion must be discounted with practicable closeness before the crops are 

 matured. An accurate report of a harvest as soon as it is gathered is 

 stale news for the public or interested buyers. It is the aim of the 

 Statistician to keep abreast of the expectations of the day in instanta- 

 neous crop reporting. There are nearly ten thousand selected observers 

 in the ranks of the reporters to the Department and to the State agents, 

 who are selected with reference to their judgment and means of local 

 observation. They arc officers of agricultural societies, or men of mark 

 in agricultural experience and general intelligence. Their accuracy and 

 reliability are manifestly enlarged with increasing experience. This is 

 attested by their returns, which exhibit greater unity and reasonable- 

 ness of statement from year to year. Formerly the averages of returns 

 of yield per acre were uniformly too high ; now they approach a figure 

 that is nearer the test of actual measurement. The prevalent custoin 

 of averaging the actual results of the harvest, as in the case of thrashers' 

 records, is one means of aiding the public judgment of what an average 

 really is. There are many evidences of a better understanding among 

 farmers of the value and necessity of agricultural statistics to them- 

 selves, to the consuming masses, to political economy and the science 

 of government. 



It would be impossible to realize the development of our agriculture 

 without the aid of statistical investigation, which shows, according to 

 the report of the Statistician, that in two decades, between I860 and 



