WHERE TO LOCATE
Unless the young farmer expects to return to the ancestral home, the
first question he must settle is where he is going to locate. Indeed,
one of the most common questions asked is, What do you think of this
state or that state or this region or that as a place to farm? There
are few questions harder to answer. This is due, among other reasons,
to the fact that every place has its advantages and disadvantages. The
sum of the advantages may be greater in one place than in another, but
if these advantages are known they must generally be paid for.
New adaptations, however, may change materially the value of the land
in a given locality as, for example, the discovery that a region is
especially adapted to raising alfalfa, onions, cabbages, apples or
peaches. Changing conditions, as the growth of population or better
transportation facilities, may materially affect the attractiveness of
a region from the standpoint of the farmer.
The competition of other regions which grow similar crops is a potent
factor in determining the desirability of a region. For example, the
farmers east of the Allegheny mountains during the nineteenth century
competed with the farmers of the central West who had free, fertile,
easily tilled land on which to grow maize, wheat and oats. Cattle and
sheep were pastured on the open range. The twentieth century has found
the land of this region settled and capitalized in some instances
beyond that of the eastern states; thus one factor at least of
competition has been eliminated.
While farm values readjust themselves in time, it often happens,
especially in the older settled regions, that farm values are slow in
reflecting these changes in economic conditions. Changed conditions
often call for a change in farm methods which the habits and
traditions of even one generation prevent. To the man who is able to
apply the proper methods the region may be a desirable one, although
under existing conditions the results may be unsatisfactory. The young
man, however, is cautioned at this point not to be overconfident of
his own ability. Under such circumstances it is well to study the
problem with great care, because the methods which seem unwise to the
casual observer may, after all, be found to be based upon sound
economic principles.
A man of 25 who is looking for a location should not only study the
present conditions of the locality, but try to predict what is likely
to be the future of the region during the next third of a century,
since this is the period in which he may reasonably expect to be
personally interested, although later in life he will find himself
quite as much interested in the more distant future on account of his
children.
Nothing is more self-evident than that one should choose a region,
especially as regards soil and climate, which is adapted to the crop
or crops to be raised, yet there are probably more failures due to a
lack of crop adaptation than to any other cause that is not personal
to the man himself. Not only do apples, for their best success,
require certain soil types, but different varieties of apples require
for their best development, distinctly different types of soil as, for
example, Rhode Island Greening, Baldwin, York Imperial and Grime's
Golden. Each reaches its best development on different types of soil
and some require different climatic conditions. In like manner apples
and peaches require distinctly different types of soil for the best
success of each and for this reason peaches are not desirable as
fillers in apple orchards.
If at the proper season of the year one goes from Pittsburg to Chicago
via Columbus and Indianapolis, he will see great fields of winter
wheat and a considerable number of permanent pastures. From Chicago to
Omaha he will see only occasionally a field of wheat and scarcely any
permanent pasture. Oats have taken the place of wheat. In parts of
Eastern Kansas and Oklahoma the predominant crop is winter wheat.
Throughout the whole region from Pittsburg to Topeka, Kansas, the
characteristic crop is maize or Indian corn. Between St. Paul and
Fargo, the main crops are spring wheat and oats. One may travel from
Winnipeg, Manitoba, to Calgary, Alberta, a distance of over one
thousand miles without seeing a field of maize. In some portions the
main crop is wheat, in others it is oats.
These are illustrations of the crop adaptation over large areas, which
has come about unconsciously, as has most crop adaptation. In other
parts of the United States are to be found even more striking examples
of crop adaptation, although the areas are much smaller, as in the
case of tobacco, potatoes, celery, onions, apples, peaches and other
fruits. Regions containing residual soils are more variable in crop
adaptation than drift soils and require more careful watchfulness on
the part of those who may wish to buy land.
As previously stated, advantages, if known, must usually be paid for.
It comes about, therefore, that if a region or a farm is adapted to
the raising of a certain crop which is more profitable than the
average, such as maize, tobacco, alfalfa, celery, apples or peaches,
this land will, other things being equal, command a higher price than
land which does not possess this characteristic.
There is an underlying economic principle which the man who goes out
to choose a farm should clearly understand. The principle has been
stated by Fairchild as follows: "The normal value of products capable
of indefinite multiplication tends always toward the value of least
costly. On the other hand, if any production cannot be largely
extended, so that the supply barely meets the requirements of the
purchasers, the tendency of normal values is toward the cost of the
most costly part of the product required to meet wants."
This principle explains why land especially adapted to raising maize
is higher priced than land primarily adapted to raising wheat. Maize
which enters into commerce is raised almost exclusively in ten states
of the United States. Wheat is harvested practically every month of
every year in different parts of the world. The young farmer should
consider, therefore, whether he is undertaking to raise crops in which
there is unlimited competition, or whether soil or other conditions
cause the output to be relatively limited.