REPORT OF THE STATISTICIAN. 



421 



tony lowers. So with wheat and other cereals ; excessive growth is not 

 to be desired, as a large yield of grain is more valuable than abundance 

 of straw, which is still burned by many wheat-growers. In the matter 

 of hay, luxuriance of growth is an element of importance, and some 

 enlargement of the standard, some increase above 100, is admissible. 



It will readily be seen that "condition" cannot be expressed in bushels 

 or pounds. There are no bushels of corn in a field just sprouting, and 

 it is a misnomer to call first growth a final product. It is the result of 

 characteristic American haste thus to discount the experiences and 

 accidents of the whole season, and say that three inches of potato-vine 

 above the surface means 90 bushels of potatoes per acre. Absurd 

 blunders in crop-report reading have often been made in that way. 

 Some of the most positive failures in the potato crop have followed a 

 condition of average healthfulness and good growth on the 1st of 

 August. The months of August and September determine the potato 

 harvest. Yet the report of condition on the 1st of August, if favor- 

 able, will be sure to be quoted in September or later, when the crop 

 has been destroyed, as an evidence of inaccuracy of the report, when 

 it only evidences the thoughtlessness or unfairness of the critic. 



It is true that the public want to know what these reports of early 

 growth indicate. It may be proper to gratify this public anxiety, if it 

 is understood that the expected result is subject to the limitations and 

 contingencies of the future. 



Any intelligent reader will perceive from the above that, so far as 

 growth may indicate a harvest, 100 must point to different results in 

 . different districts. It may promise 35 bushels per acre in the Ohio Val- 

 ley, or 15 on the Gulf coast. Each State must be considered sepa- 

 rately, and all returns consolidated for an average of the whole field. 

 This average, which has in some years been reported at 28 bushels for 

 corn, would be less with a larger proportionate area in low-yielding dis- 

 tricts, and larger with an increased proportion in the great corn-grow- 

 ing States. So it will be seen at once that a definite figure to represent 

 100 for corn, wheat, or any other crop, as a whole, cannot be made 

 exact and unchangeable, on account of the changes in the territory 

 represented and other circumstances producing variations in average 

 yield. Yet there is no difiiculty, if all these changing circumstances 

 are considered, in finding the closely approximate indications of these 

 figures of condition. 



Another fact is obvious from the above, that 100 indicates more than 

 an "average" crop. Corn in this country, in ten years past, has ranged 

 from 18 to 30 bushels per acre in different years, with an average of 26. 

 Wheat has averaged about 10 bushels in the worst season, and nearly 

 14 in the best, with an average for ten years a little above 12. 



An average crop is the actual mean rate of yield in a series of years, 

 which include some marked by 100 or more, and others by ainuchlower 

 figure. Then, 100 means a full crop, not an average one. 



Perhaps another difficulty may puzzle the brains of a reader of crop 

 returns. He may wonder why July figures are so often higher than 

 those of August, September, and October; sometimes higher than those 

 of J une. Then he may be surprised because some crops appear so gen- 

 erally to decline. This is apt to occur in cotton returns. It is simply 

 because June and July are usually favorable to growth, while April and 

 May, from frost or rain, may be unpropitious for planting and germi- 

 nation, and August and September are more liable to drought, subject 

 to insect invasion, rust, and blight. The critical time, in which insects 

 and disease make havoc, is just before maturity and fruitage. There 



