3 concerns farmers had in the late 1800's?

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I would say the top 3 were: drought, labor, and taxes.

Drought was a concern for obvious reasons, but some not so obvious reasons were: loss of labor due to income shortfall, wind erosion of soil or "dust bowl", if you were a rancher it takes years to produce a herd, so one drought could mess up 3 or 4 years worth of work. Remember there are no farm subsidies, so one drought year could mean bankruptcy too.

Labor was a concern because when slavery was abolished there was a resulting glut in farm labor, which should be good if you're a farmer. However, with so much farm labor "good workers" tended to find other non-farming jobs leaving more unskilled and inefficent workers in the labor pool, meaning underproductive and inefficient farms had to grow more crops and/or buy more land to produce the same amount of goods.

Taxes in the form of either local, national, or international could bring sales to a halt or cause gluts in certain goods. Taxes had to paid in cash as well, if you couldn't sell your goods, who cares, you need to pay up....Show more

I say look in your history book.

I think drought would be one of the 3 concerns....Show more

Use your imagination. They wouldn't be that different from concerns of contemporary farmers, would they? Financial concerns, weather concerns, land problems, etc. Use your common sense....Show more

Well, when I was working on a interpretive 1880's farm, the weather wasn't nice in the summer, we didn't have lawnmowers, that sucks having to cut it with a scythe, and once our corn didn't grow. Not to mention we had to make our own privy along with unpaved roads...Show more

not being able to feed the livestock and making money for the crops and even being able to harvest them.. weather was a big one but so was money.. it was a diffrent time back then.. too much to write down i would google it and see what ya get......Show more