The citizen-Republican. (Scotland, Bon Homme County, S.D.) 1???-19??, 1908-01-30
Profit Making Dairy ohorthorns.
Written by J. H. slaaht, Gsnsses County, Mich.

I breed Is that the beef COWS are not
noted for milk and often 90 not siVe
enough TO grow one calf successiulls
two COWS sometimes having 10 ne KEPT
to raise one calf. There are doubtless
many exceptions, but when the eNcep-
tons are marked they are general puf-
pose COWS. To illustrate the ditlefence
IN real Taiue between the peer ana
dairy S~horthornS permit me 10 quote
from the Special Report on Diseases
of Cattle and Cattle Feeding, issued by
the United States department or agrl-
culture in 1892. The report states that
1t requires about seventeen pounds or
{ digeStibie nutrients to sustain The ire
of an OK Cor cow each day so That
ne will neither lose nor gain in weight.
The OK is supposed to weigh 1000
pounds and to be kept perfectly COM
Portable as to temperature and enVlr-
onment and to do no work, or, If a COW,
to give no milk or to be otherwise wor-
ried or exercised. AS it requires the
same amount of feed to sustain the
life and we'll being of a poor or inferior
dairy cow as it does a good one and
as the good one does twice or three
times the work that the inferior one is
capable of doing in supplying milk for
the dairy or for raising calves, and is
just as valuable for making beef when
not giving milk. 1t is not difficult to see
that q large portion Of the food that
goes to sustain the animal economy,
or the life of two or three inferior
mixers to do what one good COW can
do, is lost to the feeder. to say MOTH
Ing about the care they require or the
room they occupy. Every dairyman
understands this, and if he has a COW.
nom matter how attractive in appear
ance she may be. If she does not return
| a dollars worth Of milk for a collars
worth of feed she soon Is disposed OF
and finds her way to the shambles.
Purely beef cattle have the merit of
making beef of fine quality. as well as
making it rapidly and economically,
and are thus profitable to the ranch
ma or any one whose only object is
to raise beef; but to the general farm
er the dairy Shorthorn has the double
advantage of making equally as good
a quality of beef, just as rapidly and
quite as economically. and of being
more than double the value il desired
for dairy purposes.
After more than twenty years exper-
fence in raising q milking strain Of
Shortlorn cattle the writer would con-
tlnue to try to improve in the same
line, believing that while he does not
receive as high prices for the stock
he sells as the breeders Of the beef
breeds do, they are more profitable to
MIN while thew remain on the farm.
When sne writer first heard the late
William Ball, OF Hamburg, talk cattle.
he was a vigorous advocate of the
single purpose cattle, but later, aft
er more experience and observation,
IN an address before a farmers
vocated the dual-purpose stock and ex-
pressed himself as OF the opinion that
OF all the breeds the Shorthorns were
best adapted to that purpose.
Mr.. William Gafna, the former owner
OF the famous Moss Rose 4th, clearly
indicated his preference for the dairy
Shorthorns when, after his public sale
of stock n few years ago, I was in
formed, he sold her at q good price and
later bought her back at a considerable
advance over the sale price, and let
the beef cattle go.
1t will require many years Of care
full, painstaking selection and breeding
to develop the ideal general-purpose
COW so hat she will be satisfactory
in all points and have those character
istics SO fixed that they Will be trans
mitted from sire and dam with almost
unerring certainty from generation to
generation.
May we not hope that some young
American, with the persistency and
good sense of a Bates, a Booth, or a
C~ruickshank. may yet take this matter
up and carry it to a successful issue
and thus become a benefactor of the
race.
The writer is of the opinion that
with proper selection and breeding the
Shorthorns may be made to excel the
Jerseys in the amount Of milk given, tc
at least equal to them in the amount
of butte: produced and to far exec
them In the amount and quality of beef
products, though the quality Of milk
and butter produced by the Jersey may
never me excelled. 1t requires a per-
s1stent determination, almost mount
Ing to stubbornness, to break over the
rule n breed the higher priced
though less intrinsicaIly valuable beef
cattle.