228 CATTLE INDUSTRY OF KANSAS. 
calf return of about 60 to 70 per cent. is generally looked for. 
In the case of steers, it is customary in the Panhandle district 
of Texas to allow for an annual loss of about 5 per cent., 
while with stock cattle the loss is usually reckoned at not 
less than 10 per cent. 
The* feeding of steers is a most important industry 
throughout the Western States, and maize constitutes the 
principal fodder for this purpose, the majority of farmers 
preferring to give this corn to cattle rather than sell it. 
‘The argument is,’ Mr. Young writes, “that by feeding 
cattle and getting the resulting increase in weight as 
well as the better price paid for matured beef cattle, 
a larger sum is netted from the corn than by selling 
it direct.” The Kansas farmer, therefore, when his crop is 
ready, frequently buys steers, borrowing the money to do so. 
The corn and other crops are then given to the steers, and 
these animals marketed when ready. Apart from maize and 
alfalfa (or lucerne), the most usual feeding-stuffs employed 
are kaffir corn, sorghum, soy beans, stock peas, clover, 
millet, timothy and other hays. The steers usually weigh 
about 1,000 lbs. before being fed, and, with a well-balanced 
ration, are calculated to put on, under favourable circum- 
stances, as much as three pounds a day, so that with a 
hundred days’ feeding a steer is estimated to have a live 
weight of 1,300 lbs. These figures are given as averages only; 
variations, of course, occur with the character of the 
animal and other conditions. The market price of a steer 
weighing 1,000 lbs. to the farmer is put at £7, and the cost of 
feeding the animal for 100 days isestimated at £3; against 
this outlay there is the value of the steer weighing 1,300 lbs., 
which is put at 20s. per 100 lbs., or a total of £13, thus 
leaving 43 gross profit, from which the cost of handling, 
transportation, and other incidental charges have to be 
deducted. 

THE DAIRYING INDUSTRY OF THE UNITED STATES. 
The estimated number of cows in the United States on 
Jan. 1, 1900, was 16,292,360, as compared with 15,952,883 on. 
