Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1883-02-17
strike GOOD milking strain, the tagk is made

mixer, though the milk, as a rule, is not over
rich in cream, but is excellent for cheese max
| ing and for general family use. Yet some of the
| Ayrshires have proved to be good butter makers,
and they are not without their marvellous records
! for both milk and butter They would thrive
in this northern climate, without extra shelter
! though believe it amply pays to shelter any
animal well. The Ayrshire is of medium size.
| The few Swiss cattle introduced in this coun-
.try have made some astonishing records. They
are strong -boned, medium sized, and l think
/ tolerably hardy.
With the polled or hoInless cattle I am not
familiar. They are large, and my impression is
that they are better for beef purposes than for
| the dairy. They are favorites with some.
| Probably the most prepotent, and possessing
| the longest pedigree are the Devons. They are
| good sized, wonderfully uniform in color and
outline and are entitled to be called race rath-
! er than breed. Not excessive but fair mixers,
| they give milk rich in cream and excellent for
| butter making. l think that well selected they
would make profitable breed for butter in this
section. They would make an excellent cross
on your best native" stock, soon giving you,
by the use of well-seected males, grades as good
| for butter as the pure-breds. But you must not
use grades for bulls, but constantly keep the
| blood pure on the male side.
The Friesiaus, misnamed Holsteins, are won
derful mixers. They have been bred pure in
a long time in north Holland. But they have
not been bred with much care, or system, little
attention being paid to selection for breeding
purposes. OF late years, howeyer-since the de
mand for them has sprung up in this country
more attention has been paid to breeding, and
both Friesland and north Holland now have their
herd-boOks, well guarded.
Their beef is pronounced excellent, and their
butter is the standard for quality in London and
Paris. The cream globules, as l have stated are
small but uniform in size. So there may be
some loss in making butter from them; bat their
milk is rich IN both butter and casein. Hence
it is excellent for market and for family use, and
cannot be excelled for cheese making. No cow
of four years or upwards, that does not make an
annual record of 5000 lbs. of milk can have
place in the main registry OF either the Dutch
Friesian or the ''Holstein'' herd-boek in this
country. So you see the yield of milk is enor-
nous and often reaches 10000 to $4,000 lbs. of
milk in a year. Records are reported as high as
10000 to Is, 600 lbs. a year. So much milk must
be very poor, If there is not some profit in it.
But many who have purchased "Holsteins''
have been sadly disappointed. case in point
is that of the university of Wisconsin, which
paid $500 fer an almost worthless cow These
| disappointments come from both bad faith and
bad judgment. There are many black and white
cattle In Holland and Friesland, and the adioin-
ing countries-some five or six different herds of
| them; and there are dishonest breeders in those
| countries, and dishonest importers and specula-
| tors in this. The best Judge may sometimes be
deceived, and it is very easy for an importer to
accept nicely marked animal, at low figure
without asking any question as to purity and
pedigree. But insisting on foreign registry will
make this kind of business more difficult and
less profitable In the future. If you buy, insist
on having pedigree running back to Friesland,
for all the best animals are Friesian in their
origin, and should be called Fresians. To call
| them Dutch Friesians is to simply indicate that
they are Friesians bred in Holland. To call
them ''Holsteins,'' is to give them false name,
| as neither they nor their ancestors ever came
from Holstein. 1t is a name that may cover
! multitude of sins. The only cattle in Friesland
or the Netherlands that can be properly called
Holsteins are small inferior scrubs-mongrels of
low degree. They will always dislppoint the
purchaser, if bought with the expectation of
getting good milk producing COW.
l think the animals, as a whole, that are regis
| tered in the Dutch-Friesian herd book, in this
| country, are much the best selected and most
rehable-and l speak from personal knowledge
| Of the history of both American herd books,
and from acquaintance with many of the men
controlling both associations. The triumphal
career of the Unadilla Valley herd through the
Northwest, in the falls OF 1881 and 1882, must
| be known to some of you. In 1881, it won over
'A,OOO III DIT LDO Idlr III
The Friesians appear to stand our climate well,
and with fair shelter Will do well in southern
Minnesota. They are very prepotent, transmit
ting their qualities with great certainty, and will
| give excellent grades when crossed on your
best 'natiYe'' stock.
| The Friesians and the Devons 1 consider the
most promising for dairy purposes in this sec
tion-the first for milk and cheese, and the lat
ter for butter. Next to these would commend
the Ayrshires.
| An American breed is that of Truman A. Cole,
Of Saleville, N. Y, which he calls American
| Holderness. The Holderness cattle were an
| original branch of the ShorthOrn breed and
noted for their superior milking qualities. Mr.
| Cole, about twenty-nine years ago, came into
| possession of a Holderness COW, with calf by a
HOlderness bull. The calf proved to be male.
| When yearling he used on the parent. cow,
and from this point to the present, Mr.. Cole
has followed the closest possible inbreeding
| The result is medium sized black and white
breed, good for beef and IN
excelled for butter production. The
milk is perhaps not as rich as that of the best
Jerseys, but there is more of it; and for many
years his herd of twenty COWS, always including
two or three heifers, has given an annual yield
of 300 pounds of butter per COW, besides a calf
that sells readily for S1Oe.
| The establishment of herds is not generally
understood in this country, and there is very
| strong prejudice against inbreeding. Yet all
| breeds have been established in this way. The
| Shorthorns. the Herefords, the Ayershires
| etc., were thus established. Animals of the
| best type were selected and bred
| together. The sele2 ton continued among the
offspring, and those the nearest the ideal type of
| the breeder were inbred. This selecting and
inbreeding was carried on until this type was
fixed and the animals would breed true to it.
| Then the breed was established. And SO long
as any of these breeds are kept pure, inbreeding
is really continued. The danger of inbreed1ng
lies in the fact that the bad points as well as the
good ones are intensified and fixed. Weakness
as well as strength is exaggerated
by it. Hence the necessity for constant
watchfulness, god judgment and
| careful selection of animals
| for breeding purposes. With taese, there is no
| good reason why we may not establish herds as
well as the English, and thus have our own
American breeds, adapted to our climate and to
our needs. Past experience indicates that it
| takes from twenty to thirty years to fully de-
velop and establish a new breed, by selection
and inbreeding. We may begin by crossing two
good animals-if pure bloods all the better
| But the cross must not be too Vio!ent-that is,
| the animals must not be too unlike-and close
| inbreeding, with proper selection, must follow
The great mistake of the farmers of the
country in the past has been their neglect to Sc
lect proper males to breed from; and one of the
chief advantages of pure-bred stock is the fact
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