The Future of British Agriculture Author:Sheldon Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III. THE BEEF OF THE FUTURE. Knowing what to buy, and where, are the chief points in summer grazing, and in winter feeding, too, for that matter. T... more »o buy the wrong sort of cattle at the wrong time, is what the farmer cannot afford to do ; either is bad enough alone, but the two together are disastrous. Well-bought cattle are sold already by anticipation; that is. the right sort bought cheap enough, and at the right moment, are no trouble to sell when fat. As a matter of fact, they command customers, and, so to speak, sell themselves. The right sort are seldom bought too dear, and the wrong are never cheap enough. In this respect they are something like land to rent. All the same, however, even gold may be too dearlybought, in which event there is no reward but the pleasure of owning it. Why do we graze cattle, any of us ? Just for this, to make a profit that will pay. The proof of judgment lies in success, and nothing succeeds like success. The point, therefore, to watch is the buy- ing-in; the selling-out will take care of itself. The buying-in includes the right sort of cattle, and the time and price at which to buy them. The right sort are generally young ones—three or four years old—and good ones of their breed. Old cattle—six or seven years—sometimes pay well, but they are somewhat risky. Much depends on how they have been fed as milch cattle. If they have been forced with food for several years, as the milk-sellers force them near the towns —on cooked food and brewers' grains, and malt-culms, and distillery slops, galore—they are risky indeed, as a rule. This sort of feeding undermines the constitution, unless it is very sound to begin with, and even then the animals do not fatten on grass alone. Manyof them fall away in condition when they are turned out on ...« less