86 Western Live-stock Management 
method of marketing cattle for the beef producers is to 
ship their own cattle direct to the stock-yards instead of 
selling them to a shipper. The cattle are worth just 
what they will bring on the market and selling them to 
a shipper is merely gambling on the market, and gambling 
with men who know much more about it than the pro- 
ducers. Shippers will contend that on account of their ex- 
perience and knowledge of conditions of the stock-vards, 
they can get more for their cattle when they ship them 
there than can the producer, but such statements are 
questionable. The chief value of the shipper is in buving 
Icss than carload lots. The expenses of making a 
shipment may be listed approximately as follows: Freight 
from point of origin to market; commission amounting 
to $15 a car; feed, including the small amount of feed 
which cattle will eat after arriving at the yard just before 
being sold; and yardage at 25 cents a head. In compar- 
ing prices received at central market with prices offered 
or received at home, the shrinkage must be considered, 
as noted in a previous paragraph. All expenses consid- 
ered, cattle shipped a distance of 200 or 400 miles should 
be worth at home within about 50 cents to 75 cents a 
hundred of what they would bring on the market. That 
is, the expenses of freight, commission, yardage, feed, 
and the shrinkage would make the cattle net on the 
home weight about 50 cents to 75 cents a hundred less 
than the price at the stock-yards. With long eastern 
shipments of 1000 to 2000 miles, the difference in prices 
will be about 75 cents to $1.25. 
COMPARISON OF FEEDS 
Alfalfa hay forms the basis of practically all of the 
steer-feeding that is carried on in the West. In a few 
