Present Condition Of Agriculture

PRESENT CONDITION OF AGRICULTURE

SHOW BY THE RECENT BULLETIN OF THE CENSUS BUREAU

The Value of Farms in Michigan Estimated at Over Six Hundred Million Dollars

The census bureau at Washington has issued a bulletin giving the condition of agriculture in the United States for the year 1900. It shows that there were at that time 5,739,057 farms in the entire country, which were valued at $10.674,694,247. Of this amount $3,560,198,191 or over 21 per cent represented the value of buildings and $13,114,402,056, or over 78 per cent represented the value of lands and improvements other than buildings. The value of farm implements was $761,261,550, and of live stock $3,078,050,041. These values added to the values of the farms gives a total value of farm property amounting to $20,514,001,838.

The total value of farm products for the year 1899 is given at $4,739,118,752, of which amount 81,718,990,221 was for animal products, including live stock, poultry and bee products.

The bulletin places the average size of farms in the United States at 146 acres, and it is stated that 49 per cent of the farm land is improved. The total acreage for the entire country was 841,201,546.

The number of farms in the United States has increased in every decade for the last 50 years, and so rapidly that in 1900 there were nearly four times as many farms as in 1850, and 25 per cent more than in 1890.

The live stock farm lands of the country are put down at a value of $7,505,284,273, or more than 36 per cent of the whole. The hay and gram lands at $6,379.548.543, or 31 per cent of the whole; dairy produce over 8 per cent. Michigan has 203,261 farms, valued at $690,355,734.