220 RESOURCES OF CALIFORNIA. 



indigenously in the open country, and they always suffer for 

 it. From IMarch to July the pasture is abundant and ex- 

 cellent, and the cattle are fat ; from July to October, in ordi- 

 nary years, the grasses and clovers, though dry and brown, are 

 nutritious, and the cattle still remain in good condition ; but 

 from October to January they grow lean rapidly, and almost 

 every year a considerable number of them die by starvation. 

 Either the grass may be all consumed, or it may be deprived 

 of its nutriment. The first case happens when the grass is 

 very scanty, because of a small fall of rain during the winter ; 

 the second occurs when a heavy rain, lasting a day or two, 

 comes before New Year's day, and is followed by cold dry 

 weather. The rain takes away the palatable and nutritious 

 qualities of the old grass, and the cold and dry weather pre- 

 vents the starting of the new grass, and between the two the 

 cattle suffer. In 1856, seventy thousand head of cattle died in 

 Los Angeles county alone by starvation, one-third of the entire 

 uumber in the county. The state has not one large cattle-ranch 

 surrounded by fence, and therefore, if a man owns good pas- 

 ture land, the cattle of other people come and eat the grass, 

 and later in the season his own must suffer. It is impossible 

 for the vaqueros to drive away the strange cattle, because they 

 enter the ranch on every side eveiy day, and if the grass be 

 much better than on adjoining ranches, they will, if driven 

 away one day, return the next. The proper and profitable 

 method of managing an extensive cattle-ranch, is to have it all 

 fenced in and divided off into a few large fields, in which the 

 cattle could be pastured at different seasons. It would also be 

 a source of profit to have hay for them or green alfalfa in the 

 early winter, so that there would be no danger of a reduction 

 to skin and bone : for it costs thrice as much to replace as to 

 preserve a pound of flesh. Spanish cattle, when slaughtered 

 between September and February, are usually very thin, and 

 in the Atlantic States it would be grossly impolitic to send 

 such animals to the market. 



§ 163. Imported Cattle. — The great majority of the cattle 



