VOL. XLIX. NO. 2io4. 
NEW YORK, MAY 24, i89o. 
PRICE, FIVE CENTS. 
$2.00 PER YEAR. 
TWO SHORT-HORN GENTLEMEN OF LEISURE. 
TriE JUMBOS OF VERMONT. 
T HIS name has been given to the big oxen shown at 
Fig. 99, and we would say, after a glance at them, 
that they are well named if “Jumbo” is to be taken at its 
accepted meaning of enormous size rather than at its real 
meaning of devil. These “big steers” are owned by Mr. 
Sherburn Moore, of Barnet, Vermont, the same place, by 
the way, where the “Triplet Steers,” pictured in a recent 
Rural, are to be found. They were 11 years old in April. 
Last August they weighed 8,030 pounds, with a girth of 10 
feet one inch, a hight of six feet, and a width of 3X feet 
across the hips. They are Short-horn grades of good pedi¬ 
gree, their sire having been an animal of excellent breeding. 
As an evidence of their strength, it is stated that at five years 
of age they hauled 5 % tons on a drag. They were worked 
in a logging camp for three years, and will now work any¬ 
where, as they are 
sound, gentle and 
kind. For the 
past five years 
they have lived 
the lives of gentle¬ 
men, having been 
permitted to give 
up work and de¬ 
vote their spare 
time to entertain¬ 
ing side-show au¬ 
diences. In this 
capacity they have 
been able to earn 
far more money 
than they could at 
plain work. If 
there are larger 
steers in the coun¬ 
try, the R. N.-Y. 
would like to hear 
about them. 
extraordinary character of the animal. In the year 1870, 
Mr. George Agrault, of Poughkeepsie, N. Y., exhibited 
a pair of large oxen, which were said to weigh more 
than 3,300 pounds each. The same breeder exhibited, 
in 1874, a heifer said to weigh 3,000 pounds, and a steer 
whose weight was estimated at 4,000 pounds Mr. Ag¬ 
rault gave me an account of the rearing of these cattle 
as follows: They were grade Short-horns, and were weaned 
from the cows when less than a week old; for two months 
after that they were fed on skimmed milk only, with a 
handful of wheat shorts per day. After they had reached 
four months of age, they got no milk, but were put on 
pasture, with hay; and in the winter they were fed upon 
hay with eight to 10 quarts of corn-meal per day and sugar 
beets and sweet apples occasionally to encourage the ap¬ 
petite. In all these cases there is nothing in the feeding that 
would operate, under ordinary circumstances, to increase 
the weight of an animal to these large proportions. A few 
last 10 months, §65, showing clearly that such monsters of 
flesh cost more than they come to, and are of no practical 
benefit to anybody except to interest curious sight-seers. 
In fact, it is much the same as very high farming, the 
growth of enormous crops at a cost which sometimes 
leaves the grower an actual loser. Unvarying experience 
in feeding animals for profit proves most conclusively that 
moderate weights at the earliest possible age for use give 
the most satisfactory returns, and if the statements of cost 
were always given with prize animals, and extraordinary 
large ones, the object-lesson afforded might be applied to 
practical use. _ 
THE MAKING 
OF A 
BIG STEER. 
HENRY STEWART. 
It is generally 
supposed that the 
biggest ox ever 
reared is an ob¬ 
ject-lesson for 
farmers and stock¬ 
men who are en¬ 
couraged, or sup¬ 
posed to be, to 
emulate the effort 
and by generous 
feeding to produce 
similar animals. 
But this is a mis- 
chievous error, 
and is apt to lead people astray to their loss and injury, 
for in all such cases it can be shown that these prodigious 
animals are freaks of nature, monstrosities in fact, and 
due to some extraordinary departure from ordinary circum¬ 
stances of generation and birth. Let us refer to some his¬ 
torical examples of this kind for the purposes of compar¬ 
ison with the best of the ordinary cattle which have 
reached large size and weight. 
The first instance which occurs to my mind is the enor¬ 
mous white ox bred by Charles Colling, who has higher 
claims as an early breeder of Short-horns than even Mr. 
Bates, who followed in his steps. Mr. Colling bred two of 
his cows to the noted bull Favorite, and reared the calves, 
one a heifer and the other a male, both of which were 
prodigies. The ox weighed, when five years old, 3,780 
pounds in 1801, and the heifer when three years old 
weighed more than the ox did at the same age. The ox 
was known as “the white ox that traveled,” having been 
put on exhibition and his picture was sold as a curiosity. 
But with this exception, no Short-horn at that time, nor 
for long after, ever reached any such weight, although the 
breeding and feeding were really better than at any time 
before. That it was a curiosity and unexampled was 
proved by the fact of the notoriety of it and the “ Wonder¬ 
ful Ox,” as it was called, showed very conclusively the 
THE JUMBOS OF VERMONT. From a Photography Fig. 99. 
months ago I saw a two-year-old mule that stood 19 hands 
high, or something over seven feet. The animal was simply 
a monstrosity, as are those extraordinarily large men or 
women, who become giants in stature and weight, and so 
are, on the other hand, those who are dwarfs. 
It is different in the cases of the well fed and finely pro¬ 
portioned animals shown at the fat stock exhibitions; but 
even these are not to be considered examples of practical 
usefulness and for the emulation of farmers. Mr. Agrault 
confessed to me that his big steers cost him four-times as 
much money as the meat could bring him, and he looked 
for his pay to the profits of exhibiting them at the fairs. 
Even the feeding of the ordinary fat cattle which reach a 
weight of 1,800 or 2,000 pounds is attended with loss of 
money. An account was given in the Country Gentleman, 
iu 1863, of the feeding of a grade Short-horn steer six years 
and 10 months old to a weight of 2,840 pounds; the cost 
and weight at various ages are given as follows : 
Years. 
Cost. 
Weight. 
Cost i 
per lb 
Years. 
Cost. 
Weight. 
Cost 
per lb. 
2 
$59 
1,360 
4*e. 
5*tf. 
5 
$1118 
2,570 
TjRc. 
3 
34 
1 ?35 
6 
274 
2,815 
8* 
108 
2,Oo& 
5*0. 
6 10-12 
339 
2,840 
12c. 
4 
136 
2,215 
6e. 
The growth of ,210 pounds between 3>£ and four years 
cost $28; of 353 pounds iu the fifth year, cost $58; of 245 
pounds in the sixth year, cost $76, and of 25 pounds in the 
HALF-BLOOD BUFFALOES. 
From time to time reports have reached us of efforts 
that have been made to breed the American buffalo in 
a state of domestication and also to cross this animal 
on the common cattle of the country. It has been 
found quite easy 
-----—.- to keep the buffa¬ 
lo in a state of 
partial confine¬ 
ment. The writer 
< once worked on 
a Colorado dairy 
where buffalo 
calves ran with th e 
dairy cows; but 
they do not seem 
to breed well in 
confinement, and 
as they have little 
value beyond their 
hides— particular¬ 
ly in these days 
of low-priced beef 
—there is little 
hope of their ever 
becoming popular 
farm animals. A 
cross of the buf¬ 
falo on one of our 
established breeds 
of cattle would 
seem, in theory at 
least, to promise 
very valuable re¬ 
sults. Judged by 
existing records of 
cross-breeding, a 
calf from a buffalo 
bull and a com¬ 
mon cow ought to 
have a rough, 
shaggy coat and 
something of the 
buffalo in form, 
with meat more 
like ordinary beef 
and a fair capacity 
for milk. Such an 
animal would 
seem well adapted to northern farms where tough 
“rustlers” are desired. Skins from such animals 
would be in good demand and it might be expected that 
their meat and milk would pay for their keeping. Basing 
their arguments upon what ought to be expected from 
abnormal crosses of wild animals upon those in domestica¬ 
tion, a number of sanguine writers have begun to talk 
about the “new breed” of half-blood buffaloes. Articles 
have appeared in scientific papers showing the value of 
these animals, and the government has been earnestly 
urged to appropriate large sums of money for the purpose 
of conducting a series of breeding experiments. In view 
of these facts, the R. N.-Y. takes pleasure in presenting 
the following account of the experiments conducted by 
Mr. D. H. Talbot, of Sioux City, Iowa. An account of 
these experiments has never before been in print. Later, 
we expect to print pictures of some of these cross-bred 
animals. 
“This experiment farm was established in 1885. I at 
once placed over 100 species of birds and animals on it, for 
the purpose of testing the validity of an abnormal cross. 
For some time, three or four years prior to 1885, I was in 
the field with from three to 10 men, making collections of 
wild animals and birds, mainly for their dead bodies, be¬ 
cause of the opportunity thus offered to determine the 
