WSP01593 - Laserfiche WebLink

Home Browse Search

"'" 00 r-. - 8 - conjectural. The area is isolated from good markets for milk or poultry products, and a long truck haul would be involved in transportinl' these products to a railhead or to a market. The climate is suitable for production of hay, small grains, and perhaps potatoes, but few other crops are adapted. Crops such as malting barley and potatoes for seed or for food have been mentioned as possibilities. Malting barley would be a feasible crop from the standpoint of adaptation to growing conditions unless the high altitude resulted in excessive protein content. Again, the ,amount that could be grown and marketed is conjectural. Potatoes could be grown in the area; however, markets and railheads for potatoes are located at such a distance that it is doubtful if they could be economically produced and marketed in competition with other more favorably situated producing areas. Method of Procedure Source of Data.~-Data for this study have been accumulated from a number of differ- ent sources. Detailed information was obtained by personal interviews from ten ranchers having cattle ranches ran!,ing from 100 to 225 head of breeding cows in the Little Snake River Valley. Information was obtained on resource requirements, methods of operations, yields, and rates of production for livestock, labor require- ments and costs of operations, and net returns. In addition, a group-interview technique was used to obtain information from ranchers on input requirements and costs for different crop enterprises with which they had experience. Information was also obtained on feed requirements, calf crops, and weights sold for livestock. Knowledge of the existence of some detailed records on hay yields over a period of time was also obtained at these group-interview meetings. A number of individual ranchers had kept accurate tallies of the number of bales produced on various different fields on their ranches. These ranchers were contacted