for animals. If, however,
the plan is to raise only the coarse feed, while the necessary grain
as well as other concentrates is largely purchased, a farm may easily
carry from $25 to $35 worth of live stock per acre. Lack of capital is
one of the most potent influences in preventing a larger production of
animals and animal products. Cattle paper, or notes given to secure
money for the purchase of fattening animals, is a common bank asset in
the feeding districts of the central West.

(2) The very perishable nature of animals entails a great risk in the
investment of capital in live stock. Not only the products of a single
year, but the growth of a number of years, may be suddenly swept away
by disease. This may include the crops of several years, thus
destroying capital invested in the production of the crops as well as
the capital originally invested in the animals. Many a farmer has seen
the gradual accumulations of years rapidly melt away in the presence
of some contagious disease. Tuberculosis in cattle, cholera in hogs
and liver rot in sheep are striking examples of diseases that have
caused the farmers of this country untold losses.

(3) When an animal has been properly fattened he must be sold. If held
for any great length of time, not only is there a constant outlay for
food to maintain the animal, but the condition of the animal may
actually deteriorate. Hence it is not possible to hold animals for a
better market for a long period of time, as is possible in the case of
the cereal grains.

(4) Serious losses may occur where profit was expected through a rise
in the price of foodstuffs. Scarcity in food supplies, due to an
unfavorable season, often compels the stockman to sacrifice animals
that he has been raising for two or three years. It is sometimes
asserted that, although society suffers from short crops, the farmer
is benefited, because the increase in price is greater than the
decrease in yield. One year, for example, the decrease in the
production of maize was 30%, while the increase in price was 50%. If,
therefore, the crop had been sold it would have brought more than the
crop of the previous year. The farmers, however, require about 80% of
the maize crop in the production of their live stock, so that when
there was a decrease of 30% in the yield of maize, many had none to
sell, while others had to purchase maize at increased prices or use
other crops, such as oats, which they might otherwise have