7"& Last of the Buffalo 



of recent years has made any systematic 

 effort to cross the buffalo with our own 

 domestic cattle. As far back as the be- 

 ginning of the present century, this was 

 successfully done in the West and North- 

 west, and in Audubon and Bachman's 

 ^adrupeds of America may be found an 

 extremely interesting account, written by 

 Robert Wickliffe, of Lexington, Ky., giv- 

 ing the results of a series of careful and 

 successful experiments which he carried 

 on for more than thirty years. These ex- 

 periments showed that the cross for cer- 

 tain purposes was a very valuable one, but 

 no systematic efforts to establish and per- 

 petuate a breed of buffalo cattle were 

 afterwards made until within the past ten 

 years. Mr. Jones has bred buffalo bulls 

 to Galloway, Polled Angus, and ordinary 

 range cows, and has succeeded in obtain- 

 ing calves from all. Such half-breeds are 

 of very large size, extremely hardy, and, 

 as a farmer would say, " easy keepers." 

 They are fertile among themselves or with 

 either parent. A half-breed cow of Mr. 

 Jones's that I examined was fully as large 

 as an ordinary work-ox, and in spring, 

 while nursing a calf, was fat on grass. 

 She lacked the buffalo hump, but her 

 hide would have made a good robe. The 



