Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1888-12-22
kept from becoming most unsightly from

kept from becoming most unsightly from
the accumulation OF filth.
Quiet is factor of great Importance in
fattening, and tying an animal certainly
restraints movement, but is it not en-
tirely too enforced in its character? One
has but to recall the excruciating fatigue
he experiences from standing any length
of time on one spot, as in a crowd +,
for instance, to realize the great
difference between that operation and
E&oving about even in a somewhat re-
stricted manner. In the average cat
tie shed of the west the temperature is
but slightly higher than that with
out. In view of this fact could not the
animals fight cold far better if left each
to choose where to pass the night, and
the position and direction of the body
when resting? After going over the
ground thoughtfully one is forced to ask +,
why not turn the fattening cattle into a
small yard enclosed by buildings or fences,
or combination of both, which shall
break the cold winds, and at one
side of this yard have q shed under which
the cattle may go at will to get out of the
snow or rain, so located that they can lie
down in positions best suited to comfort
and rumination and have room enough in
day time TO relieve the WEAKNESS of
limbs aid be in the sunshine on bright
days? Whether this idea is right or not
it is fact that many of the large feed
ers, men of careful, close observation,
would not tie up their cattle if the work
therefor cost them nothing.
The second point on which the small
feeder eXerts himself in the supposed di-
rection of economy is by grinding and
even steamiug the grain fed to stock.
His old country ancestors performed one
or both of these operations with the great
difference, however, that the grain
ground was what we call "small grain -
barley, oats or rye-and that these
were high in price while labor was very
low relatively. Then "dOwn East -
where our small feeders moved from,
they always feed meal to worn ont work
steers, and such cattle did remarkably
diet. The miller, while tolling his
grist literally, descants glowing
ly upon the great advan-
tages OF reducing all grain to meal. If
our farmer friend grows weary of paying
tribute to the miller he usually falls prey
to the agent of the iron grinder mill and
becomes his own miller, but not for long,
for grinding soon proves an irksOme
job, and often before the paint is worn
off the mill becomes silent monument
to the inOrdinate love of the average
American for labOr-saving machinery
and the siren-iIke seductiveness of the
average agricultural machine agent.
Any one who knows anything about
steer knows that he prefers whole
corn to corn meal and ear corn to
either. 1t costs an eighth of the
corn to grind it and another eighth to
take it to and from the mill. Why
not feed ear corn at once to the cattle,
even if Il fourth of it does nothing but
find its way into the manure heap? But
no such loss, need be incurred. With hogs
to follow ear corn can be fed with actual
economy besides the saving in labor, and
experiments carefully conducted show
this. Probably meal Will finish up
steer better than ear corn, but for the
bulk of the feeding there are no trials to
which we can point that show i'll favor of
meal over whole corn. A step still fur
Their in the right direction is 10 feed I'M
huSked corn-fodder and all to the cattle.
Such innovations will appall many
farmers; they have become SO used to
doing these things in the most painfully
tedious way that they would actually
be miserable with the uuoccupied time
left on their hands by such shortcut
methods. The traditions handed down
from the fathers are all against it, and
they viii be slow to yield. But yield
they will, though slowly. What we are
drifting toward is not more complicated
methods of feeding, but big crops TO
feed, better stock to feed it to, and
simple, rational methods of getting feed
to the animal