PRODUCTION OF MARKETABLE BEEF.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1017, 5 January 1911, Page 8

PRODUCTION OF MARKETABLE BEEF.

-THE AGE FOE SLAUGHTERING. ... The age at which.,beef .cattle been sent ' to tlie slaughterer has decreased much more than ..most people-.are aware, of. ■: IT}',;?- 1 little;- more than ;'a; it has dropped l'roni eight years to anj'tliing over fourteen mouths. Baby beef has been pronounced by, Canadian experimentalists to be the. most profitable beef . raised. The. term "baby beef" is used to describe fat cattle which, are sold, to the butcher below the average age at which animals of the breed are generally ready for slaughter. The term has been in. use among-British breeders and feeders.for at least fifty years. -In .Great Britain as- well-as in Canada any animal spld fat under eighteen months old, ex r cept a veal, calf, may be considered bab£ beef-, andvthe ; usual ago Will be froni ■ fourteen to eighteen months.; In the United States baby. be2f classes ara, pro-' vided in fat ■ stocks sliinvs for animals under olio year. ""'

- • Since the* improvement of/fnt stock was seriously. undertaken slaughtering has gradually shortened. •'-'ln 1799 tho famous Blackwell- ox, 'at the .age Of six years, yielded a butcher's carcass-of more than a ton i weight,-;aM tins ox was 'considered a model o£'a<bufchery beast. Since then the figures • supplied'by: the records of the Smitbfield'. Club iu England and by the fat stock shows in Can-ada-clearly indicate'tho. decline in the slaughtering age of the : best ; specimens of fat cattle. In 1808 the'.bestVox in six' classes at Smitlifield was more than six years old;-in 1838, the-'best ox iu anyclass was four'years and,eigftt months; in' 18GS, four years and'three mouths; and in 1898, two years and eleven months. Since IS9S several of the champions at Smithfiold have been younger'than that. The Smitlifield Club, for rqahy, years has offered . prizes'for fat-cattle under two years "of. age," and 7 as tKe example of tho premier fat s'iock club has been followed by ; similar v associations in 'Great Britain and in Canada, consider-. al>le-encouragement has for tlio rapid fattening of, immature animals. It is contended that it costs much less for every pound\of. gain. for ..an animal that retains,its calf'flesh and. is. finished under two-years ofVage than it does for' ona that has'Vbeeh' allowed to rough it aud is finished''between three ,and four years of ago or .at . a later period. Some 'authorities .TiolYl..that it is very" doubtful that a niatur?d : animal can be fattened and yield satisfactory profit. The'reason given is that when an animal has reacts ed maturity it'.does, not utilise all tlie elements in the/food' consumed; whilo the younger .animal is making bone -as well as flesh and tflkes out of the food the greater ,the-valuablo consti-tuents.-She analysis of 1 tho manure from.mature and immature animals, when compared as to the constituents remaining of 1 ) the food consumed, shows this fact very clearly. The increase abroad in the production of bab.v beef has- been brought, about partly by a.desire-of-the farmer fo obtain a quick cn«h return, and partly'by an extension of tho theory that increased live weieht iis more: economical!}* obtained, when the animal iV young. Baby beef has been condemned by some authorities on the ground that fat but immathre animals yield a greater percentage of offal, a greater proportion of fnt to lean, more watery ilesh, and flesh of less delicacy of flavour than mature animals.