442 REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE. 



Iowa and Missouri, States not yet fully occupied, have furnished re- 

 cruits for this mountain army of occupation. The correspondent for 

 Holt County, Missouri, reports that "large numbers are sent to Ne- 

 braska for ranch stock." The report from Iowa County, Iowa, says 

 that "a great many young cattle have been sent to Nebraska, and 

 fewer are fed than usual." 



It is gratifying to observe that in the Southern States there is un- 

 usual interest in stock improvement, and many reports are made of the 

 introduction of Short-horns and Herefords for beef, and Holsteins and 

 Jerseys for milk. 



There is evidently abroad in the land a desire for better breeds and 

 better methods of feeding and treatment, more general, probably, than 

 at any previous period. As prices advance, and the difference in stock- 

 value between scrubs and animals that honor their pedigrees becomes 

 more generally apparent, better blood and feed will be more appre- 

 ciated, and greater care given to cattle. And as prices advance, and 

 margins for profit are closer, the economies of feeding will be more in- 

 quired into, scientific aids invoked, and some effort made towards sav- 

 ing the one hundred million dollars, more or less, unnecessarily lost in 

 feed consumed "for fuel," on account of exposure to wet and cold, 

 avoidable by provision of shelter and suitable warmth for fattening 

 animals. Corn and hay are the most expensive materials for shelter 

 that can be used in the protection of fattening cattle. 



VALUES. 



There has been an increase in the values of horses, mules, and all 

 kinds of cattle, with a considerable decline in the prices of swine, and 

 a small falling off in the values of sheep. The comparison of average 

 values with those of last year is as follows : 



Stock. 



1883. 



1884. 





$70 59 

 79 49 

 30 21 

 21 80 

 2 53 

 C 75 



$74 64 

 84 22 

 31 37 

 23 52 

 2 37 

 5 57 















In the case of swine prices are always fluctuating from various causes, 

 the principal being the ups and downs in corn values. The home con- 

 sumption rules the price of corn, which, therefore, varies with the pro- 

 duct made ; and stock hogs and pork products sympathize with these 

 fluctuations. It sometimes happens, as in some places this season, that 

 the abundance of corn which must be consumed at once has increased 

 prices of stock hogs above the probable relative value of the hogs when 

 ready for market, because of their comparative scarcity. 



The corn failure of 1881 made pork very high in 1882, while the larger 

 harvest of that year has had some effect in reducing the value of swine. 

 Very low rates for swine or hog products cannot be expected while the 

 corn supply is below an average, as it has been since 1881. The reduc- 

 tion in exportation of corn, by reason of the high price, cannot add 

 much to the home supply ; and the loss in exportation of pork products, 

 both from high prices and hostile foreign legislation, is not a sufficient 

 factor to make pork as cheap as in the era of surplus corn production. 



The effect of the reduction of the tariff on wool is referred to very 



