14 BULL,ETi:iSr 954, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGEICULTURE. 



Most cattle grazers in the areas of good pasture want to know 

 whether to buy their steers in the fall or in the spring just before the 

 grass season opens. Some may make greater profits by buying in 

 the fall and others by buying in the spring, but there is no general 

 rule in regard to the best time to buy stockers and feeders. Of 

 course, the men who can harvest and store suitable feeds for wintering 

 cattle at a reasonable cost should, and do, usually buy in the fall. 

 In the spring, when the grass is ready, the demand for cattle usually 

 makes them cost more than the expense of wintering justifies. Even 

 in case of a falling market, the men who have bought in the fall have 

 used, chiefly, feed for which there was no other market. 



It has already been shown how the different methods of wintering 

 and the various quantities of feed affect the weights of steers during 

 the winter and how these methods and feeds affect the gains made on 

 grass the following summer. In the following discussion, an effort is 

 made to compare the costs and financial returns of the various rations 

 and methods used in the experimental work. It is felt, however, that 

 this is the most questionable and unsatisfactory part of such experi- 

 mental work and that this is especially true for the last few years 

 because of the unusual fluctuations which have occurred in feed prices. 

 The farm price of corn in this section of the country increased from $1 

 per bushel in 1916 to $1.67 per bushel in 1918, and hay increased from 

 $15.35 to $23.54 per ton. To have the costs and returns uniform for 

 making comparisons of the results obtained in the various years and 

 to simplify the calculations, average prices are u-sed. 



PRICES OF FEEDS. 



According to data reported by field representatives of the Bureau 

 of Crop Estimates and published in the Yearbook, United States 

 Department of Agriculture, the average farm price on December 1, 

 1916, 1917, and 1918, in North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, 

 Tennessee, Kentucky, West Virginia, and Virginia for corn is $1.40 

 per bushel and for hay is $19.75 per ton. We have used $1.35 as the 

 value of corn in the silage, as it often is of a poorer quality than that 

 which is marketed. For convenience $20 per ton is used for the hay. 

 As no official figures are available for the other feeds they must be esti- 

 mated, using as a basis local prices where the cattle were fed. Straw 

 and stover, accordingly, are valued at $10 per ton. This necessitates 

 using $13.33 as the price for the mixture of equal parts of corn stover, 

 hay, and straw. 



As a general rule, a ton of corn silage contains 5 bushels of corn, 

 making it worth $6.75 on the basis of the corn content. On the aver- 

 age the weight of ear corn is equal to the weight of stover. (This 

 ratio of 1 to 1 has been adopted by the Office of Farm Management.) 

 Since 5 bushels of ear corn weigh 350 pounds, the stover equivalent 

 of 1 ton of corn silage is 350 pounds. At $10 per ton this is worth 



