252 A STUDY OF FARM ANIMALS 



conditions should weigh 1,000 to 1,200 pounds when ready 

 for the market, though, if finished off with grain, even more 

 weight should be secured. Steer feeders who buy on the 

 market select cattle thin in flesh in the fall, and feed them 

 in the dry lot for a period of six months or more, marketing 

 them as fat in the spring, or carrying them over through the 

 summer, and then fattening as already explained. At the 

 Purdue University Experiment Station during the years 1907, 

 1908, and 1909 a comparative study was made of groups of 

 steers fed in the dry lot and those on pasture. The cattle 

 in the dry lot were fed shelled corn and cottonseed meal, 



Figure 100. A herd of grade yearling steers at the Ohio Experiment Station. 

 Photograph from Ohio Station. 



and mixed clover and timothy hay. As based on this ex- 

 perimental feeding, Professors Skinner and Cochel state:* 

 "From the three years work it would be safe to conclude that high 



grade calves showing beef type, early maturity, quality and capacity 

 for feed, can be profitably finished as prime yearlings if given full feed 

 during a nine months period; that dry-lot feeding is superior to pasture 

 feeding in finishing yearlings, is shown by the rate of gain, finish secured, 

 profit per steer, price received per bushel for corn, and interest on the 

 investment." 



Short-fed cattle are those that are given a heavy grain 

 ration for a period of about three months. In such feeding, 

 the cattle, if bought on the market, are comparatively soon, 

 say within fifteen to twenty days, put on full feed. Short- 



*Bulletin 142, Purdue University Agr. Expt. Station, 1910. 



