ice. One, with 1,500 acres, all told, does a large
dairying business and raises registered Dorset horn sheep, large white
Yorkshire swine, registered Guernsey cattle, and Percheron horses.
Another, with a like acreage, specializes in hackneys. A third, on his
300 or more acres, raises thoroughbreds and Irish hunters. A fourth,
with 1,000 acres, fattens cattle for market and breeds Percheron
horses, thoroughbreds, hackneys, and cattle. A fifth, owning several
thousand acres, fattens cattle for export. A half dozen others, on
farms ranging from 200 to 1,000 acres, raise thoroughbreds or draft
animals. These are the specialties; on all the farms mentioned the
owners have their secondary interests.

Some of the farmers whose capital will not permit the purchasing of
high-priced breeding stock, have long been engaged in the business of
finishing cattle for the market, animals being shipped from Tennessee,
West Virginia, and elsewhere to be fattened on the wonderful grasses
of Loudoun County. These steers are pastured from several months to
two years, or according to their condition and the rapidity with which
they fatten.

Sheep are to be found on most every large farm and are kept for both
wool and mutton. Buyers visit these farms early in the winter and
contract to take the lambs at a certain time in the spring, paying a
price based on their live weight. When far enough advanced they are
collected and shipped to eastern markets.

The rapid growth of near-by cities and the development of
transportation facilities have exerted a great influence in the
progress of the dairy industry in Loudoun County, increasing the
demand for dairy produce, making possible the delivery of such
produce in said cities at a profit to the farmer, and thereby inducing
many to adopt dairy farming as a specialty instead of following it as
incidental to general agriculture.

The dairy cows in Loudoun, June 1, 1900, numbered 8,563, of which
7,882, or 92 per cent were on farms, and 681, or 8 per cent, were in
barns and enclosures elsewhere.

If the number of dairy cows, June 1, 1900, be taken as a basis, the
five most important Virginia counties arranged in order of rank are as
follows: _Loudoun_, 8,563; Augusta, 7,898; Rockingham, 7,312; Bedford,
6,951; and Washington, 6,792.

If prime consideration be given to the gallons of milk produced on
farms only in 1899, the counties rank in the following order:
_Loudoun_, 3,736,382; Fairfax, 3,310,99