In the corn belt the lands are not so productive in grains and pasture crops as the alluvial lands of Louisiana.
In the North the growing season for crops does not exceed six months; in Louisiana the productive period is twelve months.
In Northern states, animals can be pastured in the fields during six or seven months only; in Louisiana the animals may pasture in the open the whole year.
In the North, extensive and costly barns and equipment are essential for winter shelter and feeding, and vast quantities of grain, hay, ensilage, and other foods, must be raised and stored, as the period of winter-feeding extends over six months; in Louisiana, open sheds facing south provide all the shelter needed, as aside from cold rains at intervals during February or March, there are no rigors of climate.
Careful estimates by farm experts, and by authorities on cattle, place the cost of production in Louisiana at less than 60 per cent of the cost in the most favored corn-belt states.
There is no winter here, as understood in the North. Frost is a rarity, frequently being absent for several years, and is never severe; the rainfall is well distributed and averages 60 inches a year; extremes of temperature are very rare; the average for January is 59 degrees, and for July, 82 degrees, over the Gulf Coast area of Southern Louisiana; and vegetation flourishes the year round.
The cost of summer feeding in Southern Louisiana, as compared with summer feeding in the corn-belt states, shows a difference of about 25 per cent in favor of the former.
In winter feeding, the difference is altogether in favor of Louisiana. Furthermore, practically none of the food consumed here is required to keep up the animal heat, whereas 30 per cent of the food given Northern cattle during the winter is absorbed by this requirement alone.
According to the United States Department of Agriculture, the cost of ensilage in the Northern states ranges from $1.50 to $4 per ton, and it is generally conceded that corn ensilage in the Middle West costs an average of $2.50 per ton.
On the alluvial lands of Southern Louisiana it has been proved that ensilage can be produced at 50 cents to $1.50 per ton, and the yield per acre is two crops of ten to twenty tons each, as against one crop of five to ten tons in the North.