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seed yield are obviously poor then farmers tend to cut more of the acreage for
hay. With alsike or other clovers the situation is different. Poor yields, when
they do occur, are usually not discernible so early in the season for they result
mostly from a poor seed set or wet harvest weather rather than drought. There-
fore shifts between hay and seed production do not take place with the same
facility as with timothy.

Farmers as a whole evinced interest in seed production. They were con-
cerned especially with the solution of production problems for they realized that
in forage seed they had a product that could be marketed to as great advantage
as any other which they could produce. It is possible, therefore, that the acreage
devoted to seed production will increase.

ALTERNATIVE EMPLOYMENT

Employment opportunities outside the farm can be quite valuable to settlers
as income supplements during the early years of settlement when the farm income
is necessarily small. There is always the possibility, however, that settlers will
continue to depend on a certain amount of outside income. Such a situation is
not particularly desirable for the best use of labour and capital in agriculture is
not usually attained on a part-time basis. To the extent that it persists, then,
part-time farming tends to contribute to the inefficient use of agricultural
resources and capital. Furthermore, if the employment offered is recurrent, farm
enterprises which require skill and time to build up are in danger of being dis-
rupted. For when employment is available the settler is tempted to neglect
the farm for the more immediate return of wages. Part-time industrial employ-
ment, therefore, may be a doubtful blessing to agriculture in a area if it only
serves to foster mediocre farms.

Non-farm income in the Prince George-Smithers area was quite large at the
time of this survey by reason of the good wages and high employment in the
local lumbering industry. It averaged $341 per farm. It was noteworthy, too,
that 18 per cent of the farms sampled were classified as part-time and that their
operators averaged $980 in non-farm income as compared with $187 by the com-
mercial farm operators. Furthermore, the part-time farms appeared to be on a
permanent, basis for their operators had occupied them for 11 years as compared
with 14 years for the commercial farm operators. The part-time farms, how-
ever, had only 59 acres under cultivation, the commercial farms had 90.

Newly broken land.