Page:The Extermination of the American Bison.djvu/116

 the carcasses have sold for 18 cents per pound; the bides in their dressed state for 650 to 873 each. A half-breed buffalo ox (four years old, crossed With buffalo bull and Durham cow) was killed last winter, and weighed 1,280 pounds dressed beef. One pure buffalo bull now in my herd weighs fully 2,000 pounds, and a [half]breed bull 1,700 to 1,800 pounds.

"The three-quarter breed is an enormous animal in size, and has an extra good robe, which will readily bring $10 to $30 in any market where there is a demand for robes. They are also very prolific, and I consider them the coining cattle for our range cattle for the Northern climate, while the half and quarter breeds will be the animals for the more Southern district. The half and three-quarter breed cows, when really matured, will weigh from 1,100 to 1,800 pounds.

I have never crossed them except with a common grade of cows, while I believe a cross with the Galloways would produce the handsomest robe ever handled, and make the best range cattle in the world. I have not had time to give my attention to my herd, more than to let them range on the prairies at will. By proper care great results can be accomplished."

Hon. C. J. Jones, of Garden City, Kans., whose years of experience with the buffalo, both as old-time hunter, catcher, and breeder, has earned for him the sobriquet of "Buffalo Jones,". five years ago became deeply interested in the question of improving range cattle by crossing with the buffalo. With characteristic Western energy he has pursued the subject from that time until the present, having made five trips to the range of the only buffaloes remaining from the great southern herd, and captured sixty-eight buffalo calves and eleven adult cows with which to start a herd. In a short article published in the Farmers' Review (Chicago, August 22, 188S), Mr. Jones gives his views on the value of the buffalo in cross-breeding as follows:

"Id all my meanderings I have not found a place but I could count more carcasses [of cattle] than living animals. Who has not ridden over some of the Western railways and counted dead cattle by the thousands? The great question is, Where can we get a race of cattle that will stand blizzards, and endure the driftiug suow, and will not be driven with the storms against the railroad fences and pasture fences, thereto perish for the waut of nerve to face the northern winds for a few miles? to where the winter grasses could be had in abundance? Realizing these facts, both from observation and pocket, we pulled on our 'thinking cap,' and these points came vividly to our mind: