The Cattle Trade  

Vast Proportions Which This Industry is Assuming in the South Park 

Interesting Figures on Recent Sales 

            Second only to the mining interest is the stock raising industry in Park county.  In fact the two go hand in hand ,each being, in a measure, dependent on the other and both adding rapidly to the wealth of the county.  A man well posted in the business remarks that fully half a million dollars is invested in the business in the South Park alone, and that from three to five hundred heads of families derive a whole or partial living from this source.  That fortunes are being rapidly accumulated by numerous stock raisers in the county, no one will question, and it is a nice study to determine who are the most successful and what are the methods employed to that end.  It is only within a few years that any of the western stock raisers have given attention to he grading of their herds and the improving of them by the introduction of Blood From Thoroughbreds,  yet no other method seems to point to so direct and speedy a return for the outlay.  The cattle that have been improved by such means will almost invariably command the leading price in the market. 

            During the last year or so the Leadville market, which has been largely supplied from Park county ranges are certainly to be congratulated on having so convenient and permanent a market for, not only all the beef they can raise, but for their hay and all other products of a mountain ranch. 

            The season just past has been an auspicious one for stock raising.  Cattle have increased finely and fattened rapidly and the prices offered have averaged at a very profitable figure.  Latterly the owners of herds have been rounding-up the beef cattle in order to sell before the deep snow and consequent shortness of feed should cause too much of a shrinkage in the weight.  They have so far found no difficulty in disposing of all they have offered. 

            The Leadville firm of J.S. Reef & Co., wholesale dealers in meat, has been the largest purchaser and has made headquarters at Samuel Hartsel’s ranch, at which place it has the double advantage of access to platform scales and proximity to Weston pass, which is used as a short cut to Leadville.  This firm has already, within ten days past, bought and driven off over fifteen hundred head of fat cattle and is still contracting right and left.  The details of some of the purchases are as follows: 

            Beckwith and Brother, of the Wet Mountain Valley range, sold  and delivered to them at Hartsel’s 700 head of half breeds, getting $25 for steers and $18 for cows.  This is considered a low price as the herd embraced only steers that were from three to six years old. 

            W.H. Pearce sold twenty-five head of fair steers at three cents a pound, live weight.  James L. Raynor, of Rockey, also sold about the same number at a similar price. 

            W.R. Smith, late purchaser of the J.K. Sweet ranch, at Kester, on Current creek, sold eighty head, or more, of steers that averaged 975lbs to the steer, at three cents.  This is said to have been a fine lot of cattle and which would have averaged over 1100 pounds four weeks ago.  The snow has been very heavy on the head of Currant creek and the cattle have suffered in consequence. 

            Last Sunday B.F. Spinney delivered to the same firm 142 cows and steers that averaged 1004 pounds and was paid three cents a pound for the lot. 

            Harry Rishabarger sold them forty-one head the same day that averaged 1003 pounds, and got three and a quarter cents. 

            Mrs. Mary Guiraud contracted to deliver 200 head at three and a quarter cents and has already furnished one hundred that averaged 1020 pounds.  The second hundred are to be ready for Reef & Co. by the 10^th of December. 

            Samuel Hartsel sold one lot of cows that averaged 1,111 pounds in weight, some days since, at three cents, and has now contracted 150 head of steers for delivery on the 20^th of December, at three and a half cents.  This herd has already been bunched in his pasture and is the heaviest lot of critters yet bought in the South Park by Messrs. Reef & Co.  They estimate the average weight at upwards of 1,300 pounds.  Mr. Hartsel has spent large sums of money in grading up his herd and the result is very clearly indicated in the above statement. 

            Messrs. Thos. H. Robbins and J.B. Simms, of Rocky, have contracted to deliver 300 head at Hartsel, on December 1^st, for which they are to receive three cents a pound. 

            Joseph Rogers sold 150 head of fat cattle about four weeks ago, without weighing them.  We have not learned the price he received.  He has still about seventy-five heads awaiting a buyer. 

            These are the principal late transactions in cattle in this county, and go far to show the causes of the prosperity that is spreading over the South Park.  The firm above referred to have also made very extensive purchases of stock raisers in the Poncha Springs neighborhood and on the southern line of this county.