SOUND STOCK

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 59, Issue 18, 1 November 1938, Page 9

SOUND STOCK

OF THE GREATEST ADVANTAGE. I THE AVERAGE FARMER’S CASE. THE ASSOCIATION HELPS. One of the most important things the Ashburton Agricultural and Pastoral Association does in promoting its annual exhibition of live stock is to give the average farmer some opportunity of viewing for himself the types and qualities of stock that the breeders of the County have to, offer. In the pens on the Showgrounds may be found, in any of the stock sections, animals that are a credit to the owners and to the district, and their exhibition gives the average farmer something to aim at. The animals do not acquire quality and good lines haphazardly; they are bred so that they wili be good, and it is only by taking the question in hand seriously that success will come. Flock Ewe Competitions. Again, the Association, together with the Mayfield and Methven Agricultural Associations, has done excellent service to the farmers by means of the flock ewe competition. This annual event has created wide interest among breeders and there is no doubt that there have been good results as a direct return. The competition is educational. It has shown over the last several years that a farmer can concentrate on a certain line and achieve success. With so many judges at work on the flocks competing there is no chance of a mistake being made; the winning exhibits really are the winners, and those who have followed the results will know how continued effort on the part of a breeder who is in earnest can lift him from the also competeds to the first place on the list. Then there is the export lamb coin-, petition. If ever a contest was promoted that reached right into the farms of the Country, this is it. Inaugurated by the Meat Producers’ Board as one means of raising quality to meet an ever-increasing demand for particular types of' carcase, the competition has been taken up enthusiastically by the Ashburton Agricultural and Pastoral Association, which adds valuable prizes to those offered by the Board. Progress Made. The Dominion has to depend on live stock for the greater part of its production for the overseas markets and the aim must be to make quality the keynote. Progress has been made as far as the care and management of stock is concerned and the Association has in many ways done its part in this district to bring this home to the farmers. It does not work for its members alone; it reaches out to every man who owns a farm, glad to help where it can.

These facts should be recognised by the man on the land and should be appreciated to the extent of supporting its meetings and other functions, and particularly by sending in entries for the annual show.

But to get back to the question of stock quality. Though there hare been improvements all round, there is, strange to say, a large percentage of replacement in recent years. Diseases certainly have caused a good deal of wastage, and in some quarters this has been held to be due to the high-pressure production methods that have been pressed into service without essential precautions being taken at the same time. Limitiing Replacement. By maintaining stock of good constitution and soundness, by seeing that good feed of sufficient nutritive value is served out to the animals, by giving attention to dams and offspring at the critical ante-natal and post-natal periods, by treating stock in a fashion they deserve, and by regular culling, replacements'" can be kept down to a reasonable limit.

In these days good constitutioned stock can be purchased easily enough, but at the same time it is a sound thing for a farmer to raise his own stock if he can. How To Go About If. On this question of stock replacement, let Mr W. N. Baton, senior investigational officer to the Department of Agriculture, say something:— With the facilities available in these days reasonable progress in live-stock improvement is within the ability of the average farmer. Moreover, the job can be considerably simplified by starting right and following a definite system. ■Such a system is as follows: Start with the best stock that the pocket will allow. Endeavour to have all female breeding-stock as uniform as possible not only at the start, but also throughout the wholes improvement programme. By this is meant that they should conform to a common type in conformation, size, breed, etc. It is a distinct advantage in this respect if foundation stock can be secured from a vendor who has been maintaining a given type from common sires for several generations.

Where there ds a lack of sufficient uniformity in the dams the progeny by a. given sire will also prove too variable, unless the sire happens to be definitely prepotent, which admirable quality is but rarely obtained ‘ except occasionally in stock from master breeders. All sires used should bo of considerably higher standard than the dams and be backed for several generations by sound, highproductive stock. Sires selected should be good representatives of the type

aimed for, and, if possible, line-bred to a. given strain.

As like produces like, the progeny from a uniform group of breeding females mated to a common sire are more likely to be uniform also. Because sires are the lesser numerically, the use of high-quality sires in such a way enables rapid progress to be made in a simple and cheap manner. Impi’ovement based on this system is mainly dependent on the sire. After considerable progress has been made along these lines further progress may only be possible by giving more consideration to the female side, but at such a stage one is verging on the position of the studbreeder, whoso case, naturally, is outside the scope of this article.

In the course of a live-stock improvement programme jt is necessary to cull out those animals which fall below the average standard in regard to conformation type, productive-capacity, constitution, fecundity, etc. This culling is in a different category from that referred to under wastage and disease. Both classes of culling, of course, must be carried out. 'Carried far enough, improvement work eventually leads to the establishment of strains, at which point uniformity for a given type is becoming fixed in the blood lines, and hence tends to be hereditable.

As in other aspects of successful fanning, measures and aids need to be employed in order to get closely to grips with the problems involved and thus avoid too much dependence on appraisal and judgment. Well-known examples of various live-stock measures and aids are herd-testing, calf-marking, pig recording, pig grading and measurement of back-fat, laying competitions and trap-nest testing of fowls, microscope and benzoi tests for hairy fibres in wool, wool counts, dressed meat competitions, sire progeny tests, live-stock shows, etc. s Increased interest in recent years in such matters is in evidence in most branches of live-stock farming. Moreover, should sufficient support Be forthcoming, there is scope for further measures of the types mentioned being introduced. It is through the employ ment of modern tools such as these that rapid progress in high-level live-stock production is rendered possible. It therefore behoves all live-stock farmers to adopt all facilities and aids available in order to obtain tire best results possible.