HIST OK Y OF H EKE FORD CATTLE 



401 



subsist upon, of course a short supply of rain 

 means a short supply of grass. 



"We have on this station about 22,000 cattle, 

 and they have about 1,000 square miles of 

 country to make use of, the greater extent of 

 which is good grazing country, and I think our 

 management of cattle is very similar to that 

 on your ranges; but I think our cattle do not 

 get so mixed up in this country as they do on 

 your ranges, as in the more settled districts 

 here a great deal of fencing is done; more for 

 sheep than for cattle, to save the cost of shep- 

 herds, as sheep in unfenced country without 

 shepherds would be useless, while cattle, if 

 bred in a certain locality, will not roam far, 

 even in unenclosed country. 



"I am glad to say that our cattle are standing 

 the effects of the drought exceedingly well, and 

 last year we were able to muster fat cattle at 

 a time of the year (November) when no other 

 station in the district could do so, which I at- 

 tribute to the fact of our cattle being Here- 

 fords and the others in the district Short- 

 horns. The herd here were originally Short- 

 horns, the station having been formed in 1863 

 with Shorthorn cattle from New South Wales. 

 I took the management of the herd in 1870, 

 and the year after we commenced . with Here- 

 fords, both to breed them pure and putting pure 

 Hereford bulls into the general herd. 



"We started our pure herd by purchasing 15 

 pure heifers from Mr. Frank Reynolds, of To- 

 cal, N. S. Wales, and purchasing a bull named 

 Cato, whose dam, Green Lady, was bred by 

 Mr. Green, of Hereford, England, and im- 

 ported to this country in calf with Cato, his 

 sire being Julius Caesar (3187). Cato was 

 purchased at two years old in Sydney, and was 

 in use here nearly 13 years, and got us a very 

 fine lot of stock. He was only fed two winters 

 (on oil cake), and I think would have been alive 

 now if we had had suitable feed for him, but 

 having no cultivated land here (except a veg- 

 etable garden), and no means of getting fodder 

 from the coast except by horse or bullock teams, 

 at about $125 per ton carriage, we do not as a 

 rule get up any fodder. We have had other 

 stud bulls in use also, bred in N. S. Wales, and 

 added to our stud females by the purchase of 

 about thirty pure cows and heifers from the 

 same colony. We have now. about 250 pure 

 Hereford cows and heifers and all the bulls we 

 have in the general herd are pure Herefords, 

 and have been for the last ten years, and the 

 herd now is getting to be all red, with white 

 faces, as I spay the cows when 8 or 9 years old, 

 and also cull and spay all inferior heifers every 

 year. 



"We got some rain last December and Jan- 

 uary that caused a spring in the grass that en- 

 abled us to commence work among the cattle, 

 branding and spaying, etc. Since January 28th 

 we have branded close on 4,000 calves, spayed 

 1,400 females, mustered 360 fat cattle for 

 butcher and 1,100 fats to go to be boiled for 

 their hides and tallow to the coast, and have 

 still about 500 more to muster for latter pur- 

 pose. 



"Our great want in North Queensland is a 

 certain and regular market for fat stock. We 

 have not a large enough population to con- 

 sume one-half of the stock fattened here, and 

 owing to lack of railways, we have no means of 

 taking them to the principal markets to the 

 south of us, and to take cattle to Sydney over- 

 land means about 1,500 miles of a drive, and 

 to Melbourne, a great deal further. 



"I consider we are fully 50 years behind you 

 in America in advancement, and we seem to 

 be still crawling on our hands and knees in- 

 stead of marching. You seem to manage mat- 

 ters more systematically in America than we 

 do, and have better plans of thoroughly testing 

 the capabilities of live stock than we have in 

 this country. 



"You will scarcely credit that there are no 

 cattle ever weighed alive at the stock shows in 

 Queensland, and no prizes given for the best car- 



LOVELY 2D (V. 15, p. 299), 21977. 



Bred by R. W. Hall, Herefordshire. A celebrated Michi- 

 gan winner. 



casses of beef, and, generally speaking, judges 

 at shows go for size more than quality in the 

 fat cattle classes. 



"I exhibited some fat bullocks about a year 

 ago at a stock show about 200 miles from this, 

 and won every prize I competed for but one. 

 That was for a pen of three bullocks from 3| 

 to 4 years old. I met five pens of Shorthorn 

 bullocks and prize was given for the heaviest 



