24 
BULLETIN 654, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
forks receiving higher prices than those who cure in the windrow 
and handle with the buck rake. Better prices are also obtained by 
those farmers who protect their hay during storage by the use of 
hay barns — and they also have a smaller percentage of damaged hay. 
The effect of increasing price on success in hay farming, with 
yields remaining nearly constant, is shown in Table VIII. 
Table VIII. — Effect of increasing price per ton on success in hay farming in southern 
Arizona. 
Price per ton. 
Number 
of farms. 
Average 
price 
per ton. 
Average 
yield 
per acre. 
Average 
area. 
Number 
failing to 
make 8 
per cent. 
Average 
receipts. 
Average 
farm 
income. 
Average 
labor 
income. 
15 
13 
29 
17 
25 
S6.00 
7.40 
8.40 
• 9.20 
10.70 
Tons. 
5.3 
5.9 
6.0 
7.1 
6.9 
Acres. 
92 
162 
90 
75 
101 
8 
6 
12 
5 
1 
S2, 759 
5,148 
3.413 
2,920 
4,542 
81, 54S 
2. 580 
1,847 
1,763 
2,761 
$23 
$7 to s: 90 
327 
! - 90 
242 
S9 to $9.90 
292 
944 
"When allowance is made for difference in size of farnx, it is seen 
that both labor income and farm income increase steadily as the 
price rises from an average of 86 per ton to an average of $10.70 
per ton, but satisfactory results from the standpoint of labor income 
are not obtained until the price is above $10 per ton. It also appears 
from both this table and table VII that high yields and high prices 
tend somewhat to go together. This is due to the fact that the 
farmers who take the best care of their fields also use methods which 
produce a higher quality of hay, and a greater percentage of them 
hold their hay for higher prices. The last line in Table VII indi- 
cates that satisfactory results are not obtained until both yield and 
price approach their maximum. 
These tables, showing the effect of price and yield on the farm 
income and labor income, tend toward the general conclusion that 
with economic conditions as they were during the three years 1913, 
1914, and 1915, hay farming is highly profitable only with both 
maximum yields and maximum prices. Hay farming was less profit- 
able than dairying, the feeding of beef cattle, or the production of 
alfalfa seed, and was less profitable than cotton farming when the 
price of cotton was 20 cents per pound, as will be shown in tables to 
be presented farther on. As the percentage of total receipts derived 
from hay rose there was a general decrease in both farm income 
and labor income up' to the point where the receipts from hay con- 
stituted from 45 per cent to 65 per cent of the total receipts. This 
indicates that hay farmers were not generally successful in trying 
to combine some other enterprise with the production of hay for the 
market. But while those farmers who devoted all their attention 
to hay farming were more successful than those who tried to combine 
it with some enterprise other than cattle, they were still much less 
