Arizona weekly citizen., 1889-06-29

IRE Phenix Herald and Gazette by their suicidal policy and unwise iourn- alism, are bound to float clouds over the fair capital city. It was not enough that they should harp over the Peralta Land Grant until they had succeeded in using that time-worn scarecrow tc the detriment of every man owning a foot of real estate in Phenix. or in Maricopa county, but the Gazette must necessarily con mence to demonstrate the failure oi feeding cattle on alfalfa. When the farmers accumulate their magnificent haystacks and look upon the product of their hours of toll, they will naturally look for buyer at fair price. that will remunerate them. So staple product as alfalfa should find no sluggish mar
 ket, it should go hand in hand with tho cattle industry. If either are eminentl.
 successful it will be when the two inter
 ests combine. The question as t | weather a sale will be found for the ha! this year, or next spring at anything like remunerative prices Is exceedingly doubt | ful and if it is not. the blame attaches t. | somebody. The editors of the Gazette
 have kept the matter of the failure O. alfalfa feeding in Phenix last year con
 stantly agitated until it has become . | household word all over Southern Ari
 zona. and their articles have who'll!
 failed to lay the blame of the failure
 where it belonged or explain the why's and wherefore for such failure. They have been blind to the fact that dis
 corning public would read those articles just exactly as they actually appeared, and would stop to reason no further than to read the Gazette's articles, which were published without varnish or veneering to polish off the rough facts that alfalfa feeding
 n Phenix proved a failure. The Ga
 zette, in justice to the great merits of alfalfa should have stated the plain truth that the whole thing was an ex- pertinent, and that the alfalfa was cut for tonnage, rather than on account of its nutritious qualities, that it was not al lowed to ripen nor properly cured, that its affect on range cattle in consequence of the ignorance in preparing the food were disasterous. Then the Gazette | lo,-o cl, o,.-,, tb ot Io c+ winter was almost fatal to the alfalfa fattening proposition; that the long. fire
 quent. and cold rains shrunk the cattle more during each storm than they would gain back in two weeks: that in many in- stances the cattle arrived at the most i'm propitious season of the year, and that in many cases they were not held on al falfa even long enough to get over their rough trip from the ranch to Phenix be- fore they were sold. Then comparison between the several ways of feeding might have been shown, showing the ef fleets of pasture and hay ali this could have been done with very little research | hOIh. Dlii lllC OGLCttC NAC OIAo' HI justice to the people of Maricopa count! and the farmers and commission mer- chants of that beautiful valley. did it take the trouble and do the work to do this subject full iustice:" It did not, but its articles are particularly constructed to mislead the cattlemen and to scare them from again undertaking to fatten cattle lt Phenix. IL is fair to presume that a great deal of hay will be looking for buy CTS this year in the country supporting the Gazette. and if the farmers have to keep their hay they will owe it very much to unwise journalism. The Phe- nix people have got right to be deliver ed from their friends if the Gazette and Herald gre to be enumerated as such.