THIRD ANNUAL YEAR BOOK — PART V. 211 



who has many uses for his dollars will not long consent, and should not, 

 to raise crops or keep any class of stock, which in his opinion does not 

 yield a good profit. 



Hon. J. B. Grinnell, who was the owner of several farms and a man 

 of extensive observation, used to say he never knew a man who kept 

 sheep and stuck to the business who did not make a success. That is 

 more than he or anybody else could truthfully say of continuously raising 

 and keeping cattle, hogs or horses. But the question is not whether 

 everybody and at all times who keeps sheep here in Iowa succeeds in 

 making good profits, but rather whether with good judgment and atten- 

 tion to business, keeping sheep is and probably will be profitable with our 

 climate, rich soil and advanced prices of land. 



Some people have claimed when land was only half or two-thirds as 

 high as now that land was too high to keep sheep here. But men have 

 continued to keep sheep in Iowa, and on the best and highest priced farms 

 and to make money at the business. It may be still more profitable to 

 keep sheep in the Dakotas and in Colorado and Montana, for it is well 

 known that large fortunes have been made and are being made in some 

 of those regions in keeping sheep on a large scale, where there are large 

 wheat stubble fields and extensive ranges of free grass, better fortunes in 

 fact than are made by tne cattlemen in the same localities. 



But if Iowa lands are too high for sheep raising, they are also too 

 high for cattle and hogs, though cattle and hogs have ruled higher the 

 past year than for thirty years. But fat sheep and lambs have also 

 brought good prices, and are now fully as high as a year ago. Chicago 

 quotations for January 9, 1903, show choice native wethers $4.75 to $5.00, 

 choice native yearlings $5.00 to $5.25. Choice light native ewes $3.90 to 

 $4.00. Heavy ewes $4.25 to $4.40. Choice lambs $5.80 to $6.00. 



I think if we take a series of ten years together it will commonly be 

 found that there is not much difference between the market price of fat 

 sheep and fat cattle, if we compare all classes, wethers, fat ewes, year- 

 lings and lambs, with steers, fat cows, heifers and calves. The fat cattle 

 are now about $1.00 per hundred less than a year ago, still choice fat 

 steers are now considerably higher than fat wethers and yearlings, but 

 fat cows are about the same as fat ewes. 



It has been proved at our experiment stations that as a general rule 

 it requires about the same amount and quality of feed to grow and fatten 

 a given number of pounds of sheep or mutton, as of cattle or beef. Ac- 

 cording to this rule ten sheep at two or two and one-half years old weigh- 

 ing 130 pounds each have eaten the same amount of feed as a steer or 

 heifer of the same age and weight, 1,300 pounds. 



Suppose now we compare ten choice two-year-old wethers, weight 

 1,300 pounds, with a choice two-year-old 1,300-pound steer. The steer 

 would sell in Chicago for about $6.30 or about $82.00. The wethers for 

 about $4.80 or about $62,00, or $20.00 less than the steer. But this differ- 

 ence of $20.00 is more than compensated by the twenty fleeces which the 

 ten wethers have produced in the two years, which should weigh ten 



