Agrarian production is undertaken all over the world within restrictions determined by nature, technology, and institutions. Climate, soil, fauna, vegetation, water, and other natural conditions are key factors in understanding how production is carried out, but they are not discussed here. Rather, their consequences on production are discussed, along with those of human activity. Although the isolation of natural factors from human action is not always possible, their degrees of interplay vary. Conditions of production should not be thought of as given. They are constantly changing, at a different pace. Those material, environmental, and institutional conditions of production in the pampas in the first half of the nineteenth century are considered in this and the next two chapters.

Natural and to some extent man-made conditions resulted in specific cattle reproduction rates and stocking rates (or density). From stocking rates and total number of head, the actual area occupied by livestock is estimated. Rather than describing natural or human factors affecting rural production, this chapter focuses upon the outcome of those factors over production. In spite of differences in matter and method, these chapters deal with conditions resulting from the interaction between man and nature. Nature is in the forefront when considering material conditions, but human action was still present behind reproduction and stocking rates, since those apparently all-natural conditions did not determine production on their own. Man is in the forefront when considering institutions, but those habits and customs developed in a particular natural setting as an answer to conditions that human action itself was modifying.