UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 
ft. BULLETIN No. 1000 
♦jyy. Contribution from the Office of Farm Management and Farm «V^I» 
\4* Economics. 2X1 
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Economics. 
G. W. FORSTER, Acting Chief. 
-S&T^U 
Washington, D. C. 
December 30, 1921 
LABOR AND MATERIAL REQUIREMENTS OF FIELD 
CROPS. 
By L. A. Moorhouse, Associate Farm Economist, and O. A. Juve, Junior Farm 
Economist. 
CONTENTS. 
Introduction 1 
Method of presentation 4 
Corn 5 
Corn silage 8 
Cotton 11 
Potatoes 15 
Sugar beets 19 
Tobacco 22 
Beans 25 
Grain sorghums 28 
Wheat, spring and winter 29 
Page. 
Oats 33 
Barley 36 
Rye 38 
Hay 40 
Grass seed crops 45 
Apples 46 
Miscellaneous crops 49 
Method of using foregoing data 51 
Value of plow lands 53 
Labor distribution among farm enterprises. . 54 
INTRODUCTION. 
There is a growing demand for information relating to the quantities 
of labor and materials required for agricultural production, especially 
with reference to the staple farm crops and the leading classes of 
live stock. In the cost of production studies which have been con- 
ducted by the Office of Farm Management and Farm Economics, 
United States Department of Agriculture, particular emphasis has 
been laid on the quantity requirements of labor and materials — 
hours of man labor, hours of horse labor, hours of tractor labor, 
pounds or bushels of seed, loads of manure, pounds of fertilizer, and 
quantities of other materials that are utilized in producing crops or 
live stock. When these items are known, it is easy to compute costs 
at any given time by applying the prevailing rate for each item. 
This method makes it possible to determine approximate costs for 
any period, irrespective of changes in material and labor rates. As 
a rule, field practice does not change greatly from year to year, and 
the hours of man labor and the quantities of material necessary in 
the production of a given crop or a given class of live stock provide a 
60765°— 21— Bull. 1000 1 
