A FARM MANAGEMENT SURVEY IN BROOKS CO., GA. 31 
cation have been repeatedly urged and are familiar to nearly every- 
one. Especially was the matter of diversity brought to the atten- 
tion of the farmers of the South by the decline in the price of cotton 
following the outbreak of the European war. More particularly 
has the recent advent of the boll weevil into the southeastern part 
of the cotton belt increased the hazard of dependence upon cot- 
ton and made the matter an urgent one with farmers of that section. 
It is of peculiar interest, therefore, to study the farms of a locality 
where a distinctly diversified agriculture, with cotton as the most 
important source of income, has been practiced for a long term of 
years. Such an area is found in Brooks County, which has for 
years been noted for the extent of diversification practiced. This 
is particularly true of the southern half of the county, which is the 
area covered by this survey. It has been pointed out that the soil 
here is a light-gray sand, representative of the Norfolk sandy loam 
and closely related types of that series. On this light soil a certain 
degree of diversification, including the growing of legumes, is a 
necessity if soil fertility is to be maintained at a point where profit- 
able yields may be secured. Necessity, thus, to a large extent, 
accounts for the development of the hog industry in this community. 
Further north in the county the soils become somewhat heavier, grad- 
ing into the types represented by the Kustan and Tifton series. 
These latter are better adapted to cotton than are the lighter soils 
of the southern part of the county. As a result, cotton is grown 
there more largely to the exclusion of other crops. 
To study the effect of different degrees of diversification upon 
profits, the farms studied have been grouped according to the degree 
of diversity practiced, the measure used being the diversity index. 1 
The results are shown in Table XIII. The most highly diversified 
farms averaged the largest in size. Eliminating the effect of size by 
the use of the index of earnings, it is seen that the least diversifica- 
tion returned 15 per cent less than the average for farms of a similar 
size, while the most diversification returned 16 per cent more than 
the average. It thus appears that under conditions found on these 
farms, with market prices normal, greater diversity means greater 
profits. It should not be overlooked that the least diversified farms 
are largely cotton farms, which carry the risk of both low yields and 
low markets, a risk that in 1914 proved all but disastrous to these 
farmers. 
1 On a farm with enterprises all of equal size, the number of enterprises will be the 
diversity index. For example, a farm with 4 enterprises, all of equal importance, would 
have a diversity index of 4. However, it is seldom that any two enterprises are of ex- 
actly the same size or importance. The method of calculating the diversity index, how- 
ever, reduces all the enterprises to a comparable basis. For the method of calculating 
the index see Department of Agriculture Bulletin 341, p. 81. 
