144 Types and Market Classes of Live Stock 



Lowest monthly prices are enclosed in parenthesis. In all but 

 one year these occurred in December, January, and February, and the 

 column at the right shows that these three months average lowest, 

 with February lowest of all. There is a steady rise in price from 

 February to August, followed by a rapid decline from September to 

 December. Between February and August the difference in price is 

 $L45. 



The spread in price of beef steers. — As a general rule, the price 

 of any particular class or grade of cattle is highest when the supply is 

 lowest, and vice versa. In the spring a large number of good, 

 choice, and prime steers are received from corn-belt feed-lots, and the 

 movement of grass-fattened steers is at low ebb. This tends to lower 

 the price of the better grades of beef steers and to increase the price 

 of the medium and common grades, so that there is relatively little 

 spread (difference) in the price of all beef steers during spring months. ^ 

 In the fall, conditions are reversed and the spread in price is very much 

 greater. In 1921 choice and prime steers sold higher in fall than in 

 spring, while medium and common steers sold considerably lower in 

 fall than in spring. The weekly price averages showed a spring spread 

 of a little less than $2, and a fall spread of about $6, or three times as 

 much. The general trend of the market during that year was down- 

 ward. These facts are illustrated in Fig. 47. 



1 Sheets, Baker, Gibbons, Stine, and Wilcox: Our Beef Supply, U. S. Dept. 

 Agr. Yearbook, 1921, p. 305. 



