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Itl’s more than a price-cost squeeze; it’s a squeeze everywhere, according to Mr. Foster. For instance, with deer damage so costly, he’d never posted his land up against the mountains, hoping that hunters would thin the herd that migrates from the haven of Shenandoah National Park to feed on Foster’s apple trees. But the same hunters who were supposed to keep deer numbers in check instead killed Mr. Foster’s new purebred bull during a Sunday night spotlighting foray. Hunters also shot a cow and two big calves. So the posted signs went up, making it safer for the livestock but also for the browsing deer.
The combination of deer damage, high taxes, high land values and depressed markets makes it hard for the Rappahannock farmer to keep forming, Mr. Foster acknowledged. But it’s the labor problem that can change hard to impossible, he repeated. Big operations can overcome labor problems with machinery which is increasingly sophisticated, effective — and expensive. But Rappahannock’s small formers can’t afford $100,000 tractors and combines, Mr. Foster said. Small farms simply do not generate the revenue or have the need to justify such an expense, he said. “You’ve got to have volume to buy big equpment that can offset your manpower prob
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