Fattening Steers 85 
each railroad division point. After arriving at the market, 
the stock is turned over to the commission man and there 
is little more for the feeder to do except watch the pro- 
ceedings and learn what he can about the market. 
In the Northwest the beef cattle are practically all 
handled either by the local butchers or through the Union 
Stock-Yards at Portland or Seattle. About the only 
exceptions are those cattle bought by Seattle and Tacoma 
packing-houses, and shipped directly to those places. 
The Portland Stock-Yards handle close to 90,000 head of 
cattle a year. Of this amount, Oregon furnishes about 
one-half, Montana about one-seventh, and California 
about one-tenth. The remainder comes from various 
parts of the West. The stock-yards in Seattle and Spo- 
kane are new. Seattle will probably handle about as 
many cattle as Portland, and Spokane somewhat less. 
The Oregon packing-houses now buy nearly all their 
cattle through the Portland Stock-Yards. The Seattle, 
Tacoma, San Francisco and Los Angeles packers, however, 
send out regular buyers into the various feeding sections 
and buy directly from the farmers. With the develop- 
ment of the stock-yards industry, there has grown up a 
class of men known as “shippers,”’ who make it a business 
to buy cattle from the farmer and ranch-man and then 
ship them to some stock-yard where they are sold in the 
open market. These men are usually able to buy this 
stock from the farmers sufficiently cheaply to enable them 
to make a profit. The chief reason for their existence is 
the fact that many of the farmers and ranch-men are afraid 
to ship to the open markets and take chances on what 
they may receive. The shippers, however, understanding 
conditions better and knowing about what the stock will 
bring, are thus able to make a profit. The only logical 
