The Brookings register. [volume] (Brookings, Brookings County, S.D.) 1903-1971, 1908-07-30
A TRIBUTE TO THE FATTED CALF

In all the wide world of cattle there
is nothing so beautiful as a well rat
ted calf. No matter whether it is des-
tined to develop into the blue ribbon
queen of the show yard or the quaint
and bony yellow steer of the dry n
dusty cactus lands of Mexico, the well
nourishing calf is a thing of beauty and
slch should be a joy. Yet in all
the broad bovine domain there is moth
ing so traitorously abused as the calf.
Note that line of Angus beauties in the
arena. all as fit as hands can make
them. See that band if range bred
northumberland crosses ready to
be shipped to the corn belt-well bred
deep in rib, broad of back, with a well
flushed look about them. There you
have the limits of ~artifice at the hands
of man and of natures work on the
wind swept plains. Between the two
there is a great gulf fixed, a gulf that
so far has seemed too wide for bridg-
ing. but which nevertheless must soon
be bridged.
Look now on the farms of the corn
belt and the older states that do not
grow much corn. The fatted calf is
the exception. See there below that
stunted willow that group OF poor lit
tie pot-bellied calves wan of counter
ance, pitably thin, prodigious of paunch
herding close together for ~momentary
relief from the pestilent flies. Moth
ing to eat to speak of, nothing to drink
but perchance a little muddy fluid
from a green scummed puddle, nothing
to live on but a bucket or wv of sour
clabbor, such is the daily fare of thOus-
ands upon thousands of calves born on
the best land in the world and yet we
wonder why we do not breed more
1 native cattle, why we have to go
SO often to tie range men for our feed
ers that will win ribbons in the show
ring.
Turn now to the calf pens at any
n OF the great markets during the
season when the calf crop runs. Or
all the manifestations of mans inhum-
anity to the brute creature there YOU
will find as fragrant an example as
may be named. The perpetual plain
tiff cry tells of hunger and misery and
suffering, OF ruthless sacrifice by mar
to the god of false economy. Cruelty
this is, pure and simple. yet in so
trite a form as almost to pass I'M
noticed. Yet always do we hear this
questiin, What would you? 1t does
not pay to feed them milk. They can
not eat anything else" That is where
the false economy comes in. 1t does
not pay to feed them milk to make
them marketable at a decent price.
1t does not pay always to Danish cruel
ty from our farms. 1t pays to get the
best out of anything we may have.
All hail the fatted calf, be he scrub
OF otherwise beef or dairy breed. He
is a thing of beauty and a lesson in
himself, and his lesson Is the appre-
citation of the eternal fitness of things
by the man who bred him and then
fattened him. The possibilities of the
matured animal are all involved in
the new born calf. 1t is not the spirit
that sacrifices the bawling vealer and
condemns the stock calf to hungry
confinement i'm a prison yard that
keeps and spreads the scrub abroad
in this great land. The fatted calf
embodies in it's beautiful rounded
freshness the forward stride of prog
ress. which is. founded first i'm real
manliness, then in intelligence and
lastly in true conception of values. A
change is at hand, the ranges will
soon to yield their teeming quota
year by year to pull the corn belt far
mer from the slough into which his
slipshod methods have plunged him. |
must breed more and better calves |
and the way lies through the pedi. |
greed bull and proper care. All hail |
the faftad calf Rrooda.a na-a