The Ohio Democrat. (Logan, O. [Ohio]) 1886-1906, 1889-06-08
THE MORAL OF 1T.
A rev of the Causes of the Present De-
preston in the Stock Market.


The sales of dairy stock this spring,
especially among blooded cattle, have
struck the zero point, and have left
abundance of room for moralizing.
The divine William said "sweet are
the uses of adversity," and breeders
now have an excellent opportunity to
collect all the saccharine matter they
have an appetite for. There can be no
substantial reason for the present de-
pressed state of the market for dairy
animals, for prices of cows were never
lower, nor the demand for dairy prod
ucts never better. The incentive for
raising good dairy stock is just as
active and more promising for the
future than it ever was. New methods
OF raising and preserving the neces-
sary feed, and new processes OF manu-
facture of cheese and butter are rapidly
being perfected, and yet the prices for
the cows, the machines for producing
the raw material, are phenomenallyl low.
We must, therefore, look elsewhere
for the cause of this depression. 1t is
not to be found lingering around that
will-o'-the-wisp called fashion. Let it be
remembered that the famous prices
paid few years ago for individual
animals were not the offerings of those
men who make their living out of the
products or the dairy. No man ever
could or would pay over hundred
dollars for COW to make cheese or
butter with, even though he anticipated
the best of calves as part of his remu-
neration, unless he attempted some
thing of a speculation in the breeding
line. So far as improving his herd
was concerned, high-priced pedigree
would not do it. That could not be ac-
complished with such fictitious means.
1t requires brains and hard work to do
this, and money cuts but small figure
in the account. How many men have
spent fortunes in collecting the best
money could buy, when rating them by
money standard, and yet they at
tanned nothing in dairy qualities that
had not been accomplished over and
over again by men of brains and few
good scrubs to start with. The uses OF
sdversity are as sweet now as they
ever were, and the opportunity oprofit
by them were never better. To do this,
however, there are few conditions
precedent necessary. One is that the
man should be mentally equipped for
the business, and he should have a
purpose and end in view worthy Of
the undertaking. Under the present
conditions it is particularly foolish to
start in the work where your grand
fathers were compelled to, that is, with
the plain, native stock OF the country.
Blooded cattle have their advantages
in the working dairy over scrub
stock, just as distinctly as the moving
machine has its advantages over the
scythe of your grandfather. The pow
ers of heredity in given line are built
upon correct principles, and have a
distinctive value in dollars and cents
for the plain, hard work OF the dairy,
and now is the time to take advantage
oil this act. not by simply buying pedi-
grees, but good animals with good ped
igrees. Remember there are scrubs
among the pedigreed stock, and plenty
of them, and as those are animals the
breeder is most anxious to part with,
you should use all your wit to circum-
vent his purpose.
There has always been too much
family pride among breeders, and too
little attention paid to the individual
merits of the animals. While, of course,
there are certain merits belonging to
families that pertain to their descend
ants, yet it must not be forgotten that
they all really belong to one family
representing the breed, and If the his
tory of the performance is fairly rep
resented in the ancestors, that is all
that can be reasonable asked, and II
the form is correct the rest can bt
safely left to the art of handling, in or
der to produce fine average OF per
formance. American Dairyman,