Santa Fe new Mexican. [volume] (Santa Fe, N.M.) 1898-1951, 1900-10-24
CATTLE and SHEEP.
They Do Not Range in Common and Feuds
Exist Between Cattlemen and
Sheepmen.
(Ainslee's NJ agazine.)

THE perennial fight between western
cattlemen and sheepmen is a study for
both the psychologist n the econo-
mist. At first glance the interests OF
these great divisions of the live stock
Industry would appear to be in COM
mon. But, in truth, this can never pc.
Cattle and sheep can no more occupy a
range in common than oil and water
can loaf coherently. The c~owpuncher
hates the shepherd with a hatred hat
is deep inc ofttimes picturesque, n
the herder begirts himself with artillery
and sullenly stands on the defensive.
The trouble between the cattle n
sheep Industries mainly proceeds from
the natural differences between the two
classes of live stock. Cattle are home
keeping in their habits. They are as
hard to lose as a house cat, unless, per-
chance, the cheerful n u~nreckoning
rustler happens along. A n COW nat
urally will make her run where she
was born. Her owner and his cowboys
expect to find her within easily Fin
limits, usually along some certain cat
tie trail that starts at a watering place
and leads back to higher ground. In Or
| binary weather, if water be easy of ac-
cess, about all the cattle will be found
some time during the day along the
creeks in the shade, or luxuriantly hook
deep in the mud. The night is spent
back on the feeding ground. Drive the
COW away, even 100 miles, and back she
will drift, though her return be to a
feeding ground by far the worse. Back
home she will come, though it be to
starve and die.
Sheep, or the contrary, are necessari-
ly nomadic. They are gregarious,
punching" by instinct. One man with
his dog can car for even 1000, though
only half that number is usually allot-
ted. The sheep herds in their ceaseless
journeying never follow one another. To
use a pat military expression, they
come zen echelon," in a path parallel to
and abutting one edge of the strip
grazed by the preceding woolly army.
Thus, if one flock eat out a half-mile
strip, ten flocks will cave an area five
miles wide. The better the feed the
slower the rate of travel. The flock
moves IN when the grass is consumed.
No diagram is needed to show the effect
of such a raid on a cattle range. The
range of the cattle is not hard to mag
inc.
ROOM GROWING SCARCE.
A quarter of a century ago, when the
wild west was virgin and and pasture,
there was plenty of room for both cat
tie and sheep. But as the country has
filled up and as The area of untenanted
or unclaimed and has shrunk, the two
branches of live stock have been driven
I'm upon each other more and more, I'M
til they are now in contention for pos
i~scssicn of the same field. Little by lit
Tie the herders and punchers nave been
forced from the plains up into the
mountains. Western Kansas, Nebraska
and the Dakotas, the western portion of
Oregon INC Washington, and all of Cal
%lfnrnia, which were once free ranges,
have become less and less available.
Even Colorado and Utah and a portion
OF Wyoming, because of the advance Of
farmers and miners, afford a constantly
shrinking pasturage. Both sheepmen
and cattlemen ave been obliged to seek
the high and u%ntenable lands in the
mountains, where the forests and the
watersheds are the only sections that
afftrd sufficient feed.
The struggle between them, therefore,
is waged chiefly in what is known as
the plateau region of the continent.
From lower New Mexico and Arizona
and western Texas %northward to the
American boundary, and from the east
Elm Montana line westward to the sum-
nit of the Cascade mountains, the
shhermen and the cattlemen are fight
ing for the control of the remaining
ranges. The sheep go into the verdant
meadows of the forests, and the cattle
men seek to expel them. The cattlemen
occupy some section where the grasses
are %succulent, and the water plentiful,
only to find the sheep working into the
same district, cropping the grass to it's
roots. The closer settlement crowds in
upon the formerly unsettled lands the
more bitter becomes the antagonism.
Frequently it breaks out in brief shoot
ing matches, in which the cattlemen
generally prove themselves the more
expert. More often it eliminates in
strained sentiments and press reports of
troubled threatened between cowboys
and sheep herders." Again it breeds
feuds which are fully as swift n de-
cisive as those of Kentucky.