16 BULLETIN 1388, IT. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 
it will be easier to create and maintain a demand which is willing to 
pay a higher price for high-quality potatoes. The better price will 
therefore have the effect of bringing the eastern markets nearer to 
the regions of supply, because it cost just as much to ship a carload 
of poor potatoes as one of good potatoes. Shipping out only the 
best grades of potatoes would reduce the local surplus and thereby 
tend to raise the average price for the total production. 
An economical disposal of the entire potato crop in the Yakima 
Valley requires efficient machinery for orderly marketing. This us- 
ually involves cooperative effort on the part of a large number of 
growers. Potato growers should study the results attained by suc- 
cessful cooperative marketing associations on the Pacific coast and 
determine to what extent it is possible for them to share in the same 
advantages which have come to these groups of farmers through 
efficient organization and marketing. 
Farmers who make a practice of growing potatoes every year need 
to understand the character of the potato industry. They should 
know why production responds quickly to changes in price, yield, 
and acreage throughout the United States and how to adjust their 
own production to this basis. A potato grower often needs to be 
more of a marketing specialist than a production specialist. 
ALFALFA 
Over 41 per cent of the State alfalfa acreage in 1919 was credited 
to Yakima County. Although the area produces the highest quality 
of alfalfa hay, this product or its substitutes is also produced gen- 
erally throughout the United States. For this reason and the fact 
that alfalfa hay will buy even less transportation than potatoes, the 
marketing possibilities for this crop are even more local than for 
potatoes. The demand for surplus Yakima Valley hay comes prin- 
cipally from the intensive dairy sections throughout the State and 
from the State sheep industry. When the hay crop in other sections 
of the State has been reduced by drought or spoiled by a rainy har- 
vest, the Yakima Valley alfalfa growers receive high prices for their 
hay. In years of generally good hay crops, a large part of the Yakima 
hay must be sold at a low price, often below the cost of production. 
This has happened twice since the World War, first in 1921 and 
again in 1923. 
The economical production of alfalfa hay in the Yakima Valley 
together with the fact that it is sometimes difficult to obtain a satis- 
factory price for the crop, seems to indicate that more of the alfalfa 
should be fed locally to livestock. This would tend to increase the 
price of hay to be sold by decreasing the surplus and also turn a 
large part of the cheap hay and fodder into livestock or livestock 
products which can better stand the high transportation costs to 
distant markets. 
A BUSINESS ANALYSIS OF PRESENT FARMING IN YAKIMA COUNTY 
Good farm organization in an area is better understood by an 
analysis of how farmers are at present utilizing the resources at their 
command and of the variations in the success which they attain. 
Such an analysis 3 was made of 111 representative farms in this area 
3 Only a small number of the representative developed farms visited were operated by tenants. For 
this reason, the study does not include a discussion of tenant farming in the Yakima Valley. 
