PROOF PILED ON PROOF 783 



manager Frank S. Hastings says that the early 

 heifers in the herd were carefully selected native 

 cattle, and these were crossed with bulls from an 

 unregistered herd that had been bred up from cross- 

 bred Shorthorn-Hereford heifers mated with regis- 

 tered Fowler & VanNatta bulls. This unregistered 

 herd was probably a little stronger in Shorthorn than 

 Hereford blood originally, but it has been persistent- 

 ly crossed with registered Hereford bulls and now 

 consists of about 1,400 cows which will show an un- 

 dercurrent of only about 5 per cent Shorthorn. This 

 is distinctly a " white face" herd, and probably no 

 herd in the west carries a wider range of Hereford 

 blood. It has had the service of more than fifty head 

 of imported registered Hereford bulls, it has drawn 

 from the Fowler & VanNatta herd, it has had several 

 drafts from the Armour herd and several shipments 

 from the Gudgell & Simpson, the Dr. James A. Lo- 

 gan and other good herds. In recent years it has 

 had drafts from some of the best Texas herds, 

 added to which there has been a "throw-in" each 

 year from a registered herd of the ranch. These 

 registered bulls after a service of two years are 

 thrown into the main herd and scattered over the 

 various ranches. 



With this unregistered herd as a bull basis the 

 native type in the main herd soon disappeared, and 

 when Mr. Hastings took charge in 1902 it was dis- 

 tinctly a high-grade Hereford herd, but with some 

 weeds in it. A pruning process has continued al- 

 most to the point of extravagance ever since, until 



