VALIDITY OF THE SURVEY METHOD OF RESEARCH. 
amount of man and horse labor required by an acre of cotton and an 
acre of corn, in both cases up to the time the cultivation of the crop 
is finished. The questions asked the farmer related not to the total 
amount of this labor but to the various operations usually performed 
and rate of work per day for each operation. That is, the questions 
were asked in the terms in which the farmer thinks. Later these 
same farmers were induced to keep accurate records of all the labor 
on their farms for a year. Table IV shows the results in com- 
parison. Because of the variation from year to year of the actual 
amount of work done per acre on a given crop even on the same farm 
it is impossible to tell whether the actual work done during the 
season for which records were made on these farms is more accurate 
than the farmers' estimates. In any case the differences are seen to 
be relatively small when compared, for instance, with the differences 
in yield on duplicate plots in field experiments on the yield of crops. 
Table IV. — Comparison of 29 farmers' estimates with actual records for a 
single season of labor on cotton and com to " laying by." 
Crop. 
Man-days per 
acre. 
Horse-days per 
acre.. 
Esti- 
mates. 
Records. 
Esti- 
mates. 
Records. 
Cotton 
10.14 
4.44 
9.80 
4.78 
5.76 
5.22 
6.05 
6.39 
INVESTIGATIONS BY M. B. OATES. 
Investigations of a similar nature were conducted in northwestern 
Louisiana. The results are given in Table V. The figures given 
are averages of 10 records and 11 estimates on cotton, 13 records 
and 13 estimates on corn, and 11 records and 10 estimates on peanuts. 
Ordinarily these numbers are too small to give reliable averages, yet 
the agreement between estimates and records is fairly satisfactory. 
Table V. — Comparison of records and estimates of man and horse labor on 
cotton, corn, and peanuts in Louisiana. 
Crop. 
Man hours per acre. 
Horse hours per acre. 
Estimates. 
Records. 
Estimates. 
Records. 
Cotton 
47.0 
32.3 
23.1 
47.7 
27.2 
29.4 
34.9 
38.1 
30.2 
34.4 
Corn 
33.1 
30.0 
Estimates were also secured from 10 farmers of the number of 
days available for field work during the year. This number naturally 
varies with the character of the weather from year to year. Later 
