10 BULLETIN 1295, U. S. DEPT. OF AGRICULTURE 
$200 per acre, and for most of the region between $25 and $60 per 
acre. Poor sandy jack-pine or scrub-oak land is not very hard to 
clear; but after it is cleared, its utility is not very great. Land which 
has been burned over repeatedly needs little or no brushing; but its 
humus has been largely destroyed, and there are charred logs and 
stumps in abundance. Only in a few restricted semiprairie areas in. 
Minnesota, ‘and a few strictly hardwood belts in all three States, is 
moderately easy clearing combined with-reasonably good land. These 
are the most important reasons that settlement in-the northern part 
of the Lakes States has been so backward. If the timber had all been 
hardwood, over two-thirds of the good land in the region would 
probably now be in farms. 
CLIMATE 
Climate is probably the next most important factor. The region 
is mostly too far north for corn as a grain crop as at present grown, 
and much of it even too far north for a good quality of silage year 
in and year out. Some parts of the region will scarcely grow good 
silage any year. Im general, the growing season is appreciably 
shorter than in the southern parts of the same States, which means 
a longer feeding season in winter and a shorter growing period in 
summer. The frost hazard in much of this region is a real one for 
many crops, such as potatoes and flax. There is a strip of land along 
the shores of Lake Superior and Lake Michigan which has a longer 
growing season but its springs are cold and late. This adapts it to 
the growing of fruits, grasses, grains, and root crops, but interferes 
with growing good corn for silage. 
These climatic disadvantages do not in any sense preclude the 
eventual profitable use of all the good land in this region for agri- 
culture. They have merely acted as a check on development and 
will probably continue so to act in the future. Land seekers have 
been willing to take up land too far north for corn, but it has been 
prairie land that could be quickly turned out into wheat farms or 
ranches. There is no instance on record of settlers rushing into a 
region and clearing off the pine stumps to grow wheat. 
The successful systems of farming generally practiced in this region 
represent a combination of hay and forage, cattle and pasture, oats 
and barley, and potatoes, sugar beets, and other root crops. Such a 
system of farming can be as profitable as any other; but the land 
upon which it is practiced will probably never be so valuable, assum- 
ing the same fertility, as that farther south which will grow corn 
as a grain crop and which has a shorter feeding and a longer growing 
season. 
A few of the physical facts upon which these conclusions are based 
are the following: The July mean temperature of this region averages 
68° F. and runs as low as 62° F. in places as compared with 76° F. 
for Iowa and Illinois. Figure 11 indicates that the frost-free period 
ranges from 100 to 170 days, being highest along the lake shores and 
to the south. There are many localities with poor air drainage, how- 
ever, which have frosts in August one year in two. The peat lands 
are especially subject to frosts. 
