Florida is wasting approximately enough good pasture to produce a meat supply sufficient to feed several states by confining the quality of the herds to the little native cattle we saw on the ranges. True, we saw lots of cattle, more than I supposed existed in the entire State, but the opportunity before the cattle men is to breed up the quality and size. That this can be done was demonstrated by some herds we visited, and the reports on those herds show that this is a better cattle breeding country than Texas, for your owners are branding a larger proportion of calves to breeding cows in herds than we are able to get.
I am sure that good cattle can be raised in Florida because I have seen them. I am sure that good hogs can be raised in Florida because I have seen them, and on the question of the hog, I wish to state that on the open range country of Florida, especially the southern part in the prairie country, where there are hard wood and cabbage hammocks, is the ideal country in which to grow hogs. I made the statement when I was here in the summer that I believed a man could fence up a range of ten or twenty or thirty thousand acres in Florida, stock it with cattle and stock it with hogs, and that I believed the hogs would pay the overhead charges of running the ranch, and my observations here for the past thirty days traveling over the State have convinced me that that statement was not very much exaggerated.
There is no reason why cattle men should not make dividends on investments while breeding up the quality of their herds, for this is a great cattle country.
I am very much surprised to find that sheep are not more generally handled on the ranges with the cattle. The absence of coyotes make sheep raising particularly attractive, and they will not injure the cattle pasturage if properly proportioned. There ought to be several hundred thousand sheep on the Kissimmee River Valley ranges. We handle large numbers of sheep and cattle together, although our ranges are not nearly so good as those in Florida.
In conclusion, I will state that I think Florida offers the best field for live stock production along improved lines of any State in America. That is, cattle can be raised here cheaper and with less uncertainty than any place I know.
A GLANCE BACKWARD AND FORWARD.
Annual Address before the Florida State Live Stock Association, January 8, 1918, by Dr. W. F. Blackman, President of the Association.
Never before have we met in circumstances so extraordinary and under the stress of thoughts and emotions so many, so various, so conflicting and perplexing as today. Our minds are engrossed and appalled by the world catastrophe into which we have been plunged. Since our last meeting, life for every man and woman of us has been changed in all its major aspects and fallen into disorder. All the peaceful routine of our thoughts and habits has been upset. Our sons and neighbors are on their way to the hideous and heroic and bloody work abroad to which they have been summoned. * * *