ved that soils from the North-West Provinces contain
an average of 18,000 lb of nitrogen, 15,580 lb of potash and 6,700 lb of
phosphoric acid per acre, these important elements of plant food being
therefore present in much greater abundance than they are in ordinary
cultivated European soils of good quality. The prairie lands of Manitoba
and Saskatchewan produce wheat of the finest quality. Horse and cattle
ranching is practised in Alberta, where the milder winters allow of the
outdoor wintering of live stock to a greater degree than is possible in
the colder parts of Canada. The freezing of the soil in winter, which at
first sight seems a drawback, retains the soluble nitrates which might
otherwise be drained out. The copious snowfall protects vegetation,
supplies moisture, and contributes nitrogen to the soil. The
geographical position of Canada, its railway systems and steamship
service for freight across the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, are
favourable to the extension of the export trade in farm products to
European and oriental countries. Great progress has been made in the
development of the railway systems of Canada, and the new
transcontinental line from the Atlantic to the Pacific, passing through
Saskatchewan via Saskatoon, and Alberta via Edmonton, renders possible
of settlement large areas of fertile wheat-growing soil. The canal
system of Canada, linking together the great natural waterways, is also
of much present and prospective importance in cheapening the
transportation of agricultural produce.

Crops

Of _wheat_ many varieties are grown. The methods of cultivation do not
involve the application of so much hand labour per acre as in Europe.
The average yield of wheat for the whole of Canada is nearly 20 bushels
per acre. In 1901 the total production of wheat in Canada was 55-1/2
million bushels. In 1906 the estimated total production was 136 million
bushels. The total wheat acreage, which at the census of 1901 was
4,224,000, was over 6,200,000 in 1906, an increase of nearly two million
acres in five years.

Up to the close of the 19th century, Ontario was the largest
wheat-growing province in Canada. In 1900 the wheat acreage in Ontario
was 1,487,633, producing 28,418,907 bushels, an average yield of 19.10
bushels per acre. Over three-quarters of this production was of fall or
winter wheat, the average yield of which in Ontario over a series of
years since 1883 had been about 20 bushels per acre.