are the preference of the crop for a cool climate, its sensitiveness to soil conditions, the competition of corn and oats for stock feeding, and of these and other products as "cash crops." Moreover, the warm and humid summers which characterize a large part of the United States are unsuitable to the production of the best grades of barley.

But in the favorable regions barley production has made rapid progress. Between 1870 and 1912 the national production increased nearly ninefold-1870, 26,295,000 bushels; 1890, 67,168,000 bushels; 1912, 223,824,000 bushels. Since 1909 the acreage has on the whole remained stationary, although the crop has undergone a considerable geographic redistribution.

The two chief barley-producing sections of the United States are now the extreme West, especially California, and the upper Mississippi Valley States Minnesota, the Dakotas, and Wisconsin. In each of these sections a predominant commercial type is grown; and these types enter into a distinct trade. The market price depends in part on their suitability to the use to which they are put. The six-rowed California Feed or Bay Brewing barley is known as an "export" type, being preferred by European brewers. The brewers of the Central and Eastern states used chiefly the Manchuria and Oderbrucker varieties grown in the northern Great Plains. For pearled barley is used a large-grained, two-rowed variety known as "Chevalier"; this type is grown under irrigation in Montana and in the delta lands of California.

Usually California produces more barley than any other single State, but the chief center of production is located in the group of North Central States, which in 1919 contained nearly one-half the total area in barley. Other important barley-producing States in the Mississippi Valley are Iowa, Nebraska, and Kansas; in the West, Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana, and Colorado; east of the Mississippi, in Michigan and New York. Of the 57,705,000 bushels shipped out of the producing counties in 1919, California contributed 16,500,000 bushels and the States in the upper Mississippi Valley about 34,000,000 bushels. These regions and New York usually produce better malting barley; elsewhere feed barley is more generally grown. The acreage, production, and yield per acre for the United States since 1902 are shown in Table 2.

3 Farmers' Bul. No. 968, U. S. Department of Agriculture. 1823-208

MAP 2.-GEOGRAPHIC DISTRIBUTION OF BARLEY ACREAGE IN THE UNITED STATES. (From Yearbook, 1916, U 8. Department of Agriculture.)

(Continued)

STATE
Ma

CENSUS 1909

ESTIMATE

1915

4,494

5,000

4,136

5,000

3,888 9,000

2,738 6,000

2,567 6,000

N.Mex.

2,131 8,000

848 1,000

Other

2,166 No estimates

East

1,132,026

973,000

West.. 6,566,680 6,422,000

U.S... 7,698,706 7,395,000

TABLE 2.-Acreage, production, and yield per acre of barley in the United States, 1902-1920, and in Canada, 1908-1920.

[Figures for the United States are from the Yearbooks of the Department of Agriculture; for Canada, from the Canada Yearbooks.]

4

2,646,000
2,552,000

1 Preliminary estimates.

Westward movement of barley production.-Prior to 1890 New York was of much greater importance as a barley-producing State than it is to-day. According to the testimony of maltsters in former tariff hearings, the barley grown in the Northeast, although of not so good a quality, was mixed with the high-grade barley imported from Canada and used in the manufacture of malt. In this industry New York led all the States. The principal malting centers were Buffalo and Oswego, located within easy access of both sources of supply. The tariff legislation of 1890, however, raised the duty on barley from 10 to 30 cents a bushel, thereby causing a marked diminution in the importation of the grain. With the supply of Canadian barley virtually cut off, and in the face of competition from other types of agriculture as well as of western barleys, the center of the malting industry moved westward to Milwaukee, Chicago, St. Louis, and Minneapolis.

The westward movement of barley cultivation is indicated in Table 3, showing the acreage and production of the principal States at 10-year intervals since 1889.

4 Tariff Hearings, Committee on Ways and Means, 62d Cong., 3d sess., 1913, p. 2665 et seq. Also S. Doc. No. 56, vol. 1, p. 582.

TABLE 3.-Acreage and production of barley in the United States, by principal States. 1889-1919.

[From Yearbook, U. S. Department of Agriculturc, 1918; and Thirteenth Census.]

In Canada the production of barley has not increased so rapidly as in the United States. In 1871 the total production was 11,496,000 bushels; in 1891, 17,222,000 bushels, and in 1910, a short-crop year, 28,846,000 bushels. In 1918, a record year in Canada, 77,287,000 bushels (a little over one-fourth the American crop) were produced on 2,646,000 acres. In the decade prior to 1916 the acreage in barley was almost stationary, but it has since increased considerably. The acreage, production, and yield per acre for Canada as a whole since 1908 are shown in Table 2, and by Provinces since 1890, in Table 4.

Formerly the most important barley-producing Province was Ontario, but from 1890 to 1915 its acreage materially declined, while its production remained around 15,000,000 bushels. This Province, together with Quebec (producing between 2,000,000 and 3,000,000 bushels annually), has long been noted for its excellent barley. Before 1890 large quantities of the grain were exported from eastern Canada to the United States, where it was converted into malt.

Most of Canada's barley is now raised in the prairie Provinces, where its production has rapidly increased. In 1919 these three Provinces harvested 41,000,000 bushels, of which Manitoba, the principal producer, grew over 18,000,000 bushels. By American maltsters