552 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



Most of the feeders interviewed prefer cattle in the two-year- 

 old form. This is evidenced by their stating that the average length of 

 feeding period was six months, which is about the time required to 

 make two-year-old cattle prime, is longer than is necessary for three- 

 year-olds and is too short for yearlings or calves. It is further evidenced 

 by the average weight which they considered they had found most 

 profitable, viz., approximately 1,350 pounds. This is too light for three- 

 year-olds and too heavy for yearlings or calves. Then, again, the 

 question put to them directly as to whether they had found 1,500 or 1,600 

 pound steers profitable as a rule, out of 721 replies, in round numbers, 70 

 per cent answered in the negative. All of this is further confirmed by the 

 answer to the question direct as to what age they usually put their cattle 

 on full feed. A study of this age summary is exceedingly interesting and 

 instructive, as the results are very striking. For example, out of a total 

 of 680 replies from Missouri, 257 or nearly 40 per cent, gave two years 

 as the age at which their cattle were put on full feed, which would mean 

 with a six months' feeding period, as was reported by them in answer to 

 previous questions, thirty-months-old cattle when finished and ready for 

 market. Thirteen per cent gave two and one-half years of age, and eleven 

 per cent gave essentially the same answer, namely, "between two and 

 three years, of age," as their preference. Thus more than 62 per cent 

 of the Missouri feeders reported that they put their cattle on feed at 

 between two and three years, as contrasted with less than four per cent 

 who put them on feed as calves and less than four per cent who put 

 them on fee3 at one and one-half years of age. What is true of reports 

 from Missouri is essentially true of Iowa and Illinois. 



Tetidency to Baby Beef. — Whatever may be said about the production 

 of baby beef, the feeders of the corn belt are not yet making baby beef. 

 There has been, however, a very strong tendency in this direction within 

 the last third of a century. \ 



Baby beef is quite another thing from what it was even twenty-five 

 years ago. Then a 30-months' old steer, weighing 1,400 pounds 

 would have been classed as baby beef, and it would really have been a 

 baby compared with the three, four and five year old bullocks then stan- 

 dard on the market, weighing from 1,600 to 1,800 or even 2,000 pounds, 

 thick, fat and hard. G. A. Bradford, a veteran feeder of Boone county, re- 

 ports the sale in the early 60's of a car load of cattle, weighing an average 

 of more than 2,500 pounds, for $11 per hundred, and adds that at that 

 time the larger and older the cattle the higher price they brought. 



Our point of view has changed radically. The market demands have 

 been revolutionized. These huge bullocks are no longer on the market 

 and would be no longer in demand if presented. We have been gradually 

 hastening our cattle to market, cutting down their ages and weights, until 

 a twelve-months'-old steer, weighing 800 to 900 pounds, will bring as 

 high a price as any other age and weight, provided he is fat and pro- 

 vided such calves be not offered in too great numbers. Size and weight 

 do not any longer constitute a limitation to baby-beef production. Accord- 

 ing to our present interpretation of baby beef no steer would be so classed 

 outside of his yearling form, and as a rule, the maximum weight is from 

 1,100 to 1,300 pounds. 



