34 BULLETIN 631, U. S, DEPARTMENT OP AGRICULTURE. 



The comparative cost of 100 pounds of gain for lots 1, 2, and 3 

 are $6.86, $9.05, and $9.14, respectively. The calves of lot 1 are 

 seen to have required a very small amount of cottonseed meal and 

 a comparatively large amount of cheap roughage to make 100 pounds 

 of gain, while the opposite is true of the calves of lot 3, which re- 

 ceived shelled corn as a concentrate. The calves of lot 3 required 

 more than twice as much grain to make 100 pounds of gain, some- 

 what less alfalfa, and only a little more than half as much silage. 

 This resulted in more expensive gains for the calves receiving corn. 

 The amount of feed required to make 100 pounds of gain on the 

 calves is considerably smaller than the amount required to put the 

 same amount of gain on mature cattle. In fact it is seldom possible 

 to make gains on any class of cattle in the dry lot, except calves, at 

 a smaller cost than the selling price of the animals. This was done 

 with the calves of lot 1. 



The exclusive use of cottonseed meal as a concentrate for feeding 

 calves has resulted invariably in good daily gains and very economi- 

 cal gains, but at the same time there has been a tendency for such 

 calves to grow more and fatten less than is desirable while fattening. 

 This has resulted in such calves selling for somewhat less than corn- 

 fed calves, as shown in Table 18. The difference in selling price is 

 often great enough almost to overcome the difference in the cost of 

 production. There was a difference of 49 cents per 100 pounds in 

 the selling price of the calves of lots 1 and 3 and a difference of 41 

 cents per hundredweight in the selling price of the calves of lots 

 1 and 2. 



Strictly prime calves can not be made by feeding cottonseed meal 

 as the sole concentrate, and though it is not always most profitable 

 to put the maximum finish on calves it is usually more profitable to 

 have them well finished than half fat. It is more frequently the 

 case that extra finish on calves pays better than it does on steers of 

 two years or older. 



FINANCIAL STATEMENT. 



Although any financial statement that is made is more or less un- 

 satisfactory because there are so many variations from year to year 

 in the prices of feeds, selling prices of animals, and margin of profit 

 that the financial outcome may be reversed completely if any very 

 radical change is made in any one of these factors, such a statement 

 usually is desired by the reader and is of some value for compara- 

 tive purposes. 



One-half the calves used in this experiment were purchased for 5 

 cents a pound, pasture weights, without any shrink, so all the calves 

 are charged in at that price. At this price the farmers made a 

 profit raising them, as the cows were worth but about $45 each and 



