El Paso herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1901-1931, 1910-11-12
Where VIII Beef Come From
When Farmers Take All Land?
Question Already Facing COm-Evy Day
Range Region Is Drawn Closer
By G A Afart

, barnyard effects. Some make the pill
| grimage in the old schooner of 'ht
J plains, but these are only for shor
distances as a general rule: most o
! the new homeseekers travel in freigh
cars, and they are coming to the wes
so fast that the stockman is finding
himself literally buried beneath ths
avalanche of farm tools. The stock
man is disappearing; his ranch is far
nishing homes to farmers, but wig
Will furnish the meat is the question
that is yet unsolved.
Encroachment Continues.
Gradually the encrOachments of the
homesteader and the farmer are driv-
ing the big cattlemen out of business
in the United States, even in that re-
gion once called tine trackless west,
where there is no longer the room nee
essary for the big herds which ranch
men must own to be successful as
caItlemen.
Day by day the ranchmen have been
crowded back into the mountains from
the valleys and onto the desert from
the plains country, as the settlers came
in their prairie schooners and special
emigrant cars, until now there is little
space left for the herds that once held
the whole country west of the Missouri
as their own. Texas, New Mexico, Ari-
IONA. Idaho, Montana, Washington, Ore
gon and all the western states are
diving back the cattlemen to make
room for the farmer-the farmer from
the more crowded eastern, southern
and central western states. As Iowa
and other states show a falling off in
population. the western states are
showing an increase along with a de-
crease of livestock herds. The farmer
is moving to the west from overpopu-
lated areas and every farmer who
makes the move, draws the circle closer
about the cattleman.
Is Mexico the Answer:
Many are finding their way to Mex
leo. where there are yet vast areas
of virgin range and where cattle rats
ing is proving profitable for those
who have already gone, but even Mex
leo is bidding for the farmer rather
than the stockman. For years. Mex
leo has been the home of the big IL
ciendado-the man who controlled mil
lions of acres of grazing lands-while
Mexico has bought its cotton and it's
corn in a large measure, and its wheat
from countries where there is more
agriculture. But there is still much
room in Mexico for both the ranch
man and the tiller of the soil, and big
ranches are being transferred bodily
from the United States to Mexico.
Many ranchers in the United States,
however, are going out of the business
entirely, or going into the cattle rails
ing business on a large scale, so VIVA I
the result is going to be on the price
of beef can only be surmised, but those
who study the situation cannot see any
prospect of a reduction in price or
even of the price remaining as low
as ii is now.
Land Too Valuable.
Aside from finding their ranches too
cramped, the ranchmen in many Il,
stances are finding that they can ge>
such prices for most of their lands
from farmers that they are in many
instances willingly retiring from the
more or less risky business of CATTLE
and becoming millionaires by
the sale of their lands at prices few
years ago undreamed of, to the man
who would till the soil. Acre after
acre of ranch land in west Texas has
been cut up into small homes that are
now affording a livelihood for many
farmers and their families. Much OF
the Panhandle country in Texas has
gone the same way. Much OF the
mountain and valley country in most
of the western states has likewise
vanished from the area heretofore
classed as grazing land. and, under
improved methods of conservation Of
moisture and cultivation, even tee
plains of Montana and Wyoming and
Idaho are being transformed from
where roamed vast herds, ~
small homes where the farmer tills
he soil. Just where the matter is :;
going to end; what the result is go
hg to be, is puzzling the eco1emist.
who realizes that the country must
nave beef, but is unable to say where
I is to come from.