CATTLE HERDING. 887 



be your main dependence for winter, or from December on to the 

 middle of March. All through the season of growth guard 

 every rod of this grass that lies next your winter shelter and 

 water that you can possibly spare from your summer grazing. 

 Keep the cattle off from these chosen acres as carefully as you 

 would the hand of a thief from your purse, that the grass may 

 make a full and undisturbed growth throughout the entire season, 

 so that when your cattle have been driven by the blizzards to 

 the canyon, on the first let up of the storm, you can see them 

 feasting on the rich and nourishing food (for such it is), without 

 a long trip over the bleak prairie. 



But change these conditions ; let your cattle (as they natur- 

 ally will) crop short all the grass near their shelter and water, 

 leaving for your winter range the remote parts of your herd- 

 ground, miles away (perhaps), and your chances of a successful 

 wintering of your herd are wonderfully diminished, your hard- 

 ships increased, and the probabilities are that in the spring the 

 number of your hides may exceed that of your cattle. 



Be careful that your water is pure (not alkaline), abundant, 

 and easy of access, or, you will lose many of the weaklings in 

 the spring when all are comparatively weak. Experience proves 

 to me that where an animal once gets down in the mud and 

 water, no matter how promptly rescued, you may about as well 

 strip off its hide. A few dollars spent in making a stone bottom 

 to your watering places, and in making easy grades where the 

 banks are precipitous, would greatly reduce one of the most 

 serious dangers that beset the winter and spring herd. Neglect 

 of these precautions sometimes causes disastrous results late in 

 the spring. A late storm drives the stock that was all doing 

 well into their old winter shelter, and in attempting to drink after 

 the frost is all out of the ground, but before it has settled, one 

 after another gets mired and drowned until the stream is filled 

 with their carcasses, and the careless ranchman discovers when 

 too late that one hundred dollars spent on his watering-place 

 would have been a splendid investment. 



Do n't try to winter without fencing your water and shelter, 

 and it is by far the safest to fence a part, at least, of your winter 



