No. 6. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 539 



only two months more feeding to finish them properly, brought 

 twenty-five cents a hundred less than that finished up to the standard. 

 That was about the condition of the market which made ail our 

 cattle go into market faster than they could be made; later on in 

 the year there was hardly a time when the finished cattle could not bo 

 shipped into the Chicago market at a higher price than ever before. 

 In the Pittsburg market they quoted beef from the blue grass cattle 

 at eight dollars per hundred advance. The demand therefore is, not 

 only for beef cattle, but for beef cattle of a correct type ready to 

 meet the market demands. It shows the tendency toward the pro- 

 duction of beef in our State. Our breeders and our feeders now are 

 beginning to aim their attention to the production of beef cattle in 

 Pennsylvania. I have been in Pennsylvania a little over two years 

 and just now we are receiving more letters in regard to the rais- 

 ing of beef cattle in Pennsylvania in a week than we did during 

 the entire year I was at college. Within the last month one farmer 

 at least, and very likely two, have established th^ nucleus of a beef 

 herd in Lancaster county, so that the tendency is to produce more beef 

 cattle than ever before. 



Now, the question is whether these men will be justified in the 

 change. During the last twenty-five years there has been a tremen- 

 dous change in the beef market. Take an average of five years periods 

 in the Pittsburg and Chicago markets, we find at the end of each 

 five years that the cattle were worth more, and the demand was 

 larger than during the preceding five 3^ears. So that the price of 

 cattle is increasing and at the same time our soils in Pennsylvania, 

 and in the West, are increasing in fertility and the tendency is to 

 put more animals on the farm and put back the fertility, and at the 

 same time use up the roughage. When we pay more attention to the 

 question of soil maintenance, we will have a great many more cattle 

 than we have at the present time. At the College we have now 

 twenty pure bred beef cows that we are trying to handle in the 

 most economical method possible, and see whether it will pay in Penn- 

 sylvania to keep a cow for the calf she produces. We are feeding 

 them a ration of corn silage and cottonseed meal— about forty-five 

 to fifty pounds of silage and one pound of cottonseed meal per 

 head daily. Since the first of December they have gained a trifle 

 over a pound a day per head, which shows that they are not only 

 maintaining themselves but are putting more fat on their bodies. 

 Throughout the summer (ney will be granged without grain, and in 

 the meantime we are feeding two market lots, one of which is given 

 all the cottonseed meal they can eat, without grain, and the other 

 is put on a grain ration with corn silage and cottonse-ed meal. You 

 will notice we have absolutely discontinued feeding hay to our 

 market cattle this year. 



This is not because hay is not good, but in our local market we 

 have hay selling for from twenty-four to twenty-six dollars pc" 

 ton, while silage is costing us less. 



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