AGRICULTURE was thus 137,864, and that of permanent pasture 311,929, an increase of 73,086 acres since 1878. In the same year the live-stock was classified as under : — Horses Cattle Sheep Pigs 24,788 99,339 333.7°o 24.565 The increase in horses and cattle is largely due to the necessity of stocking the increased area of permanent pasture ; sheep are about as numerous as before the rains of 1879 and 1880. The acreage of land occupied by tenants was 406,845, that occupied by owners 42,948. The total number of the various holdings was 6,470, made up thus : — Above 1 and Above 5 and Above 50 and not exceeding not exceeding not exceeding 5 acres 50 acres 300 acres 1,395 2.724 2,098 253 Above 300 acres the average size of the holdings being 69!- acres, and the number of holdings of 50 acres and under had decreased by 1,362 since 1880. The number of cattle per 1,000 acres was 184, which must be compared with 154 for England generally ; the number of sheep was 619 compared with 452 for England. In 1905 Herefordshire, from her 22,043 acres of wheat, produced 709,225 bushels, or an average of 32'i7 bushels per acre, the average for England being 32-66 bushels per acre. ' In the ten years from 1895 to 1904 the average crops of the county per acre as compared with those of England may be tabulated as follows : — Wheat Barley Oats Beans Peas Hereford, bushels . 29'05 30'34 35'47 26-21 26-00 England, „ . 30-53 32-58 40-71 27-39 2^-36 _ , , Turnips and -- , , Potatoes f J Mangolds Swedes ^ Hereford, tons . .... 5-33 13-18 1+72 England, „ . . . 5-84 11-91 18-39 In the same ten-year period Herefordshire produced an average of 24" 1 1 cwt. per acre of clover, sainfoin, and grasses under rotation, against 28-79 cwt. for all England, and only 16-58 cwt. per acre of hay from permanent pasture, against 23-61 cwt. for England, the lowest average of any county but Huntingdon, and in striking contrast to the 37'4i cwt. of Westmorland. The hop crop of the county amounted to 88,802 cwt. in 1905 grown on 6,851 acres, an average yield per acre of 12-96 cwt., but this was very exceptional, the average yield per acre of the ten previous years being 6-83 cwt., and in 1904 the yield per acre was only 2-08 cwt.^' Until 1797 there was no Agricultural Society in Herefordshire,^" but in that year a society was established comprising most of the principal landowners and farmers, and numbering a few years after 120 members. Since then many local societies have arisen, the Leominster Agricultural Association, the Herefordshire Horse Show Society, Herefordshire Fruit, Grain, and Chrysanthemum Society, the Wormside Ploughing Society, Bosbury Horse Show, Pembridge and District Ploughing Society, Kington Horse Show, Kingsland Foal Show, Bromyard Colt Show, Glasbury and Wyeside Agricultural Society, Eardisley Ploughing Society, and many others. The Royal Show has never been held in the county, but the Bath and West of England visited Hereford in 1865 and 1875.
- Herefordshire has shared with the rest of England the agricultural depression of the last
generation. From the evidence taken before the Royal Commission on Agriculture in 1893, it appears that rents in the county had been reduced from 20 per cent, to 30 per cent, since 1879. In replies to questions sent to various parts of the county in 1907 the reductions are said to be about the same generally, though in some districts they have been smaller, and in others larger than this. For instance, round Holme Lacy rents have not been reduced more than 10 per cent. ; near Bromyard some have fallen 40 per cent. If anything there is now an upward tendency, but it is very slight. The average farm to-day contains 200 to 300 acres, though in some parts, as near Brampton Bryan, they run to 400, and there are large hop and fruit farms of 500 acres, while in the Bromyard district the average is 120 acres. The greater part by far of the grass-land is used for grazing Hereford- shire cattle ; where there is any dairying Shorthorns are the favourites and occasionally Jerseys and crossbreds. There are probably more farms rented at from 20s. to 2$s. an acre than at any other figure, though good grazing-land, hop-land, orchards, and accommodation-land naturally command a " The highest average in Great Britain was 46-14 cwt., grown in Renfrewshire. " The average yield per acre in England between 1895-1904 was 8-64 cwt. ; in Kent, 9-15 cwt. " The Board of Agriculture was established in 1793 ; and many shows were started about this time, the Bath and West of England in 1777, Smithfield Club in 1793. 419
