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WHAT THE MABKET DEMANDS. 



We have gone through a slight change in the class of cattle that the 

 market demands. A few years ago the most marketable cattle we had' were 

 cattle that weighed from fifteen to sixteen hundred pounds. Today the most 

 popular cattle we have on the market, properly finished, are cattle that weigh 

 about twelve hundred pounds. During the past year, if we could get them 

 finished at that weight, the most popular cattle we had going on the markets 

 of the country were those that weighed about eight hundred pounds. I 

 think you will find that in the future our cattle business will go through 

 the same process of evolution that the hog and sheep business went through. 

 Originally in this section of the country the most successful hog man was 

 the man who could send to Chicago the heaviest hogs that were produced 

 in the county. The most successful sheep man was the man that would 

 handle the heaviest withers. Today the most successful hog man you have is 

 a man who is able to finish his hogs at weights of 175 to 200 pounds; your 

 most successful sheep man is the man who can produce his lambs and get 

 them on the market in prime condition weighing under 80 pound's. 



Our beef cattle are going through the same process. It is rare that we 

 see a four or five year old steer. It is exceptional to see a three year old steer 

 in our feed lots, and it is getting to be a common custom to feed yearlings. 

 To those men who are backing the feeding of yearlings this year for the first 

 time I will say that in the end the most successful yearling feeder is the man 

 who makes his cattle the fattest. A yearling may be the most disappointing 

 individual ever shipped' to market if shipped from thirty to forty days 

 before he is really ripe. They do not ship like the older steers. The great 

 bulk of men who have tried to feed yearlings, tried to finish them for market, 

 have become discouraged.- They are men who ship them from thirty to 

 sixty days before they are ripe. There is more money lost in feeding year- 

 lings and shipping them before they are ready than in any other way. 



FACTOBS WHICH SPELL SUCCESS. 



I have talked in a rather rambling manner. I think I can sum it up, 

 however, in a comparatively few words, and will try to do so. Success, 

 which means practicing of the greatest economy, is dependent: 



First, upon the ability to produce feeds which beef cattle can consume. 

 If you can produce those feeds profitably you can feed them. 



Second, upon the ability to produce cattle of the type and the quality 

 which the market will demand. 



Third, upon your ability of putting this feed into the cattle in such a 

 manner that they will make the greatest use of it, supplementing it, if 

 necessary, with feeds which will increase the efficiency of those feeds which 

 you have produced. 



Fourth, if you are not in a position to produce the cattle, to be able to 

 go to the market and buy the class of cattle which have proven the most 

 economical for you to handle in relation to the feeds which you have pro- 

 duced. 



In this way you will get a maximum production from your soil, you 

 will get a maximum production from your cattle, and through a series of 

 years you will find that cattle will return to you as great a value for the 

 feeds you have produced as you can secure in any other manner. That in the 

 end is the purpose of the cattle to furnish a market for what is grown on 

 the farm and at the same time maintain the fertility of the soil. 



The most important function which cattle perform in any community 

 is in developing a permanent system of farming. A man cannot go out, buy 

 a farm and put on cattle and get through with it and consider it a year's 

 work. It is the work of a lifetime. It is the work of maybe the lives of 

 two or three generations of men to produce the kind of cattle which are most 

 desirable. You will find whenever you go into a community where the 

 breeding and production of livestock has been the major industry through 

 a series of years there the people are permanently attached to the land. 

 You will find fathers and sons follow each other in the cattle business. By 



