The Caldwell tribune. [volume] (Caldwell, Idaho Territory [Idaho]) 1883-1928, 1884-10-24

We note sales of several hundred east
ern calves at western stock yards. a
S16.50 to S1S per head. These calve:
net the eastern dairymen S13 to S15 pei
head, and it is becoming a new branch
of the dairy income there. These are
mostly raised upon skim milk. Most Of
these eastern dairymen never raised as
good calves for Il emselves, as they Ia
bored under the opinion that such extra
feeding would not pay; but when they
could realize the cash for them at these
rates, at from five to six months old, ii
quite revolutionized their ideas of value
and set them to studying the feed
ing problem. In fact, they found that
a good calf cost but little more than a
poor one-about $3.50 to SO worth of
oil meal and middlings made the differ
ence in cost between a calf worth So
and one worth S15. This showed them
that if they could raise a six months
calf at a profit, they might possibly,
grow it till eighteen or twenty-four
months old, and sell it as early-ma-
tured beef, at a profit.
This problem must be worked out for
them be others, under their own eyes
before it can impress them. In a few
localities parties are doing this success
fully. One, whom we know, in Chau-
tauqua county, buys each year thirty of
the best of these calves that he can
find, at a cost of S15 per head, and,
feeding them one year, sells them to
the local butchers at $50 per head,
making for n years keep 1856 per
head-a better profit, he thinks, on his
food than he can make by dairying, the
labor being so much reduced. His farm
is only seventy acres, and most of it in
good meadow. By this plan he only
hires a little labor in haying time, thus
reducing his expenses to a low figure.
He thinks he will soon be able to keep
fifty of these young things by buying
some grain feed, and this he is quite
willing to do, because it enriches the
which goes to improve the
farm. He has now tested this plan for
several years, and is able to make a
pretty uniform result. He is now
building a new barn, and proposes
water-tight re%ceptacles for the manure.
so as to completely save all the liquid
and solid droppings. This plan will
produce a rapid improvement of
the soil, and he finds, prac-
tically, will pay a large profit.
When examples like this shall multi
ply and show the farmers of the eastern
states that under a system of full feed
ing, beef car be grown in competition
with the west, it will soon produce an
entire change in the old, half-starving
system of raising young stock that
weigh, at m year 800 to 400 pounds,
at two years, 600 to 700 pounds, and are
never worth the food they have eaten.
Eastern dairymen are learning rapid
ly, as witness the fact that there are ten
good calves produced now where one
was ten years ago. Every year brings
numerous converts to the economy of
liberal feeding, both for milk and beef.
The Chicago Fat-Stock show has awak-
ened much attention to this sub
iect of better feeding, and its
prizes for the most economical
growth, at one, two and three years,
head of Cost of Production"
teach a great lesson on this point.
Farmers will not heed any but practi-
cal lessons. They cannot yield a long
habit without many practi-
cal proofs of a better way, but it looks