310 AGRICULTURAL REPORT. 
It is to this country that Mr. Seth E. Ward refers, when he says: 
Tam satisfied that no country in the same latitude, or even far south of it, is com- 
arable to it as a grazing and stock-raising region. Cattle and stock generally are 
4 
sealthy and require no feeding the year round, the rich bunch and grama grasses of 
the plains and mountains keeping them, ordinarily, fat enough for beef during the 
entire winter. | 
All this region east of the Black Hills is at an elevation of less than 
5,000 feet. The mean temperature, as recorded at Fort Laramie for a 
period of twenty years, is 50° F. Colonel C. H. Alden, post surgeon at 
Fort D. A. Russell, speaking of this region, says: 
_The largest snow-fall, so-far, in one month, has been 2.097 inches. The snow in this 
vicinity, rapidly disappears after falling, and there is rarely a sufficient quantity to 
o 
afford sleighing. 
All this country of the North Platte, east of the Black Hills, is within 
a short distance of the railroad at Cheyenne, Pine Bluffs, or Sidney, An 
abundance of timber can be had in the Black Hills for fencing and 
building purposes for all ranch and stock men in any of those valleys. 
There is in the North Platte Basin, east of the Black Hills, an 
area of at least 8,000,600 acres of pasturage, with the finest living 
streams, and good shelter in the bluffs and cafions. These 8,000,000 
acres of pasture would feed at least 8,000,000 sheep, yielding 30,000,000 
pounds of woo!, worth $7,500,000. Now that amount of money, instead 
of going to build up ranches, stock-farms, storehouses, woolen-mills, and 
all the components of great and thrifty settlements, is sent by our wool- 
dealers to South America, South Africa, and to Australia to enrich 
other people, while our wool-growing resources remain undeveloped. 
With any number of these immense valleys contiguous to railroads, 
timber, and coal, open to settlement, and with a demand for all the beef, 
mutton, and wool that can be.produced, it is impossible to foresee the 
grazing wealth that is to be develeped in the Rocky Mountain country 
Within the next ten years. 
THE DAIRY. 
PROGRESS OF CHEESE MANUFACTURE. 
During the year 1870 a large addition has been made to the number 
of cheese factories in the United States. In New York alone there are 
reported to be two hundred more factories than in 1869, and the increase 
in the West has been remarkable. The tendency, however, being toward 
smaller factories and the carrying of milk shorter distances than in past 
years, a large proportion of the establishments recently erected in the ~ 
older dairy districts, especially in New York, have withdrawn territory 
from other factories, while still another portion have absorbed private 
‘dairies. In addition to these influences, which modified the busi- 
ness of the season, protracted drought lowered the average produc- 
tion of individual factories. Notwithstanding these cirumstances, the . 
cheese product of the United States for 1870 is decidedly larger than 
that of 1869, some authorities estimating the excess as high as 17 per 
cent. This increased production, combined with unwise management 
by producers in pushing forward large quantities of cheese during the 
warm weather, thus overstocking the market at the most unfavorable 
Season, caused a marked decline from the prices of 1869. The depressing - 
effect of cverstocking the market was aggravated by the inferior keep- 
ing qualities of the cheese made during the extreme heat of July and 
