86 



very profitably even more profitably, usually than the higher 

 grades. Of course it is the raiser of the plainer cattle who 

 has to bear the loss. Because this loss does not happen to come 

 out in the fattening operation is no sign it does not exist. The 

 feeder simply shifts to the man who raises this poor class of 

 cattle. After all this is where it belongs. 



The Margin as Affected by the Season of the Year. It has al- 

 ready been shown that gains are made more cheaply in summer 

 than in winter. In our experiment, the summer gains were 

 about 20 per cent cheaper, or cost only about four-fifths as much 

 as did those made in winter. It is clear, therefore, that this would 

 affect directly the size of the margin required. It is a common 

 experience with buyers that feeding cattle are considerably 

 higher in the spring than they are in the fall. In other words, 

 the feeder market has adjusted itself to this requirement of the 

 situation. 



The Margin as Affected by the Price of Corn. Scarcely any- 

 thing affects so directly the cost of gains as does the value of 

 the feed from which they are made. Obviously, a larger mar- 

 gin would be required with corn at 50 cents per bushel than 

 when it can be purchased for 30 cents, the selling price of the 

 cattle remaining the same. It is a common experience, however, 

 that when corn is high fat cattle and hogs are quite likely to be 

 correspondingly high. This is particularly true of the spring 

 and summer following a short corn crop and a winter of high 

 priced corn. It is not so apt to be true of the fall and early 

 winter of such season, and it is almost never true at that time 

 in the year for half fat cattle. This is because many feeders 

 are too timid to carry their cattle on to a good finish, and crowd 

 them on the market in a half fat condition. In the normal 

 year, or with corn at the ordinary price, these cattle would 

 be carried along until finished and would therefore be marketed 

 at a considerably later date. In years of high priced corn, there- 

 fore, there is upon the market an unusually large number of 

 such cattle at a time that normally takes care of a large number 

 of short fed cattle and a large number that have gotten par- 

 tially fat on grass. All of this conspires to force the market 



