The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1877-10-11
[ NUMBER 10.
Choosing Cows.

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The object Of this article is not to
puff any particular breed of cattle, but
to try and convince those farmers who
keep few COWS, of the Importance of
keeping better animals than they
usually do at present. Very many
farmers, after milking their cows, use
the milk for various purposes. with
out ever testing it's richness or finding
out how much butter or cheese it
would make; nor do they ever inquire
whether they have the breed best
adapted for the use they are making of
them. Yet it is well-kn0wn that GER
tain breeds are most profitable for but
ter and cheese making, and others for
supplying the milkman. Some believe
that COW that will fatten fine veal
calf cannot be q good animation butter
and cheese making, but my own expe-
rience convinces me that any good
dairy cow will do this, and that it is
only rarely that COW worthless for
other purposes, can doit.
It would well pay all farmers to get
rid of all COWS Of an inferior breed by
sending them to the butcher so soon as
they have been brought to a good con-
dition; and it is therefore desirable to
know the lowest capacity of those that
should be kept. A good cow will make
at least, two hundred and fifty pounds
of butter per year, and one that viii
not do that is not worth keeping on
the farm. Indeed, at the present
price of dairy produce, it will cost
nearly that to pay the expense of care
and keeping. AS to the best breed to
keep, l presume the Jersey would be
the most profitable where butter-mak-
ing was the chief object, as COW Of
that breed often gives, in thirty days,
milk enough to equal her own weight;
and moreover this is very rich in but
ter Of that fine flavor and golden hue
which commands q high price in the
market.
But where stock-raising can be com
biued with this, as is The case on most
farms in this part of the State, Short
horns would undoubtedly prove a bet
ter breed, or at any rate cross be-
tween the Short-horn and an inferior an
imal, forsuch a grade will give more and
better beef at any age than the com
mon scrub stock which far too many
farmers are cursed with. A neighbor
of mine sold, last Spring, at five cents
Iper pound, four grade two-year-old
steers which weighed a trife over LOO
pounds, apiece, while another farmer,
a short distance off, sold a scrub
beast which, when four and a half
years old, after having cost much
more to keep, only weighed 900 pounds
and brought only four and a half cents
a pound; andI have known greater
differences than this.
Itshould be strongly impressed on
the minds Of all farmers that if they
cannot afford pure-bred COWS, they
should buy ful-blood bull-calf from
some good herd, thing that can be
done at price within almost any ones
means; and then they should grade up
their stock as fast as possible, and
keep no COWS on the farm that will not
yield a pound of butter q day for ten
months in the year. I am confident
most farmers could, without difficulty
do this-by careful management and
by selecting the offspring of good
mixers and crossing them with bulls
Of a well-known strain. At any rate,
the improvements effected by this
means would soon rid this section Of
the country of the many worthless
COWS that now keep too many farmers
poor instead Of enrjching them.
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