THE INFLUENCE OF CROSS-BREEDING ON THE PROFITS OF A DAIRY HERD.

Otago Witness, Issue 2006, 4 August 1892, Page 8

THE INFLUENCE OF CROSS-BREED-ING ON THE PROFITS OF A DAIRY HERD.

The following paper by Henry Simmons, Bearwood Farm, Wokingham, was read at the Dairy Conference, mention of which is made by our English agricultural correspondent : —

Cross-breeding is easily said, but, so far as my experience has gone, it is somewhat difficult to carry on with success. Having selected your fancy as to the two pure breeds from which you start, the first cross is simple enough, and often results in some very extraordinary animals, according as your idea may be for the production of beef or milk ; but the difficulty I have found is in carrying on the cross, as after using the pure sire the second or third time, the offspring usually possesses all the characteristics of the male progenitor. On tho other hand, if you leave the pure breed and carry on with the produce ot the cross, a mongrel breed is apt to result. In a very well thought out article on the Jersey cow, lately written by Mr John F. Hall, in the Journal of the Bath and West of England Society, which all interested in butter-making would do well to read carefully, Mr Hall says as follows : — "Yet, if amid the dairy farms and homesteads of England there had appeared during the last 30 years some man impressed with the object of

IMPHOVINO Tlir. HRUKD 01' ufIrTKR COWS, some Booth or Bates, with an eye quick to make all variations of practical moment, and with a genius to fix and to intensify these variations in a breed, who can doubt that by this time we should have had in England a recognised type of fanner's butter cow.'' Now, this is exactly what 1 atte.mpted some years since at Bearwood, with the greatest success for the first or even second Dross, but then arose my difficulty, that of maintaining the cross, as the animals chitted back to the pure breed of the sire used. The breeds I selected were the Jersey cow and the shorthorn bull, and some very remarkable animals resulted from it, giving a large quantity of very rich milk, and when ■fatted alter leaving the dairy, weighing from lOOst to 120 st (81b per stone) dead weight, and meat of the finest quality ; but, as time went on, the offspring possessed all the characteristics of the shorthorn only, rataining, h iwever, this qualification, and it is well to note this — they maintained their milking qualities obtained from the original Jersey cross. I selected animals so produced from the herd, and crossed thorn respectively with the Jerbey, Guernsey, Devon, aud other pure breeds, but iv no case was it satisfactory — a more or loss mongrel offspring resulted. So that I w.i 3 forced to the conclusion that, whether your fancy is with the Shorthorn, Jersey, Guernsey, Hereford, Polled Angus, or any other pure breed, according as you want to produce beef or milk, you do well after the first two crosses to go back to the pure breeds on both sides, One cow I had was bought by chance at market, rather a meanlooking animal, with probably several different crosses in her breeding, although when showing her as I did twice successfully at the British Farmers' Dairy Show, I described her as a crocs between Ayrshire and Shorthorn. She was a great milker, and very rich in quality, but had not the size necessary for beef afterwards, consequently to such a cow it seems to me the pure- bred Jersey is preferable.

Passing on to the latter part of my subject, namely, that of profit to the dairy, I think ho much depends as to the class of cow to be encouraged on the farm iv which the produce is disposed of ; as if selling milk, at the present low standard as to quality, is the one object, and where the situation is favourable, that is generally acknowledged to be the most profitable method. The better type of what aro called our ordinary bred Shorthorns carry off the palm for quantity of milk and size of carcase. On the other hand, as a butter cow pure and simple, the Jersey, and, I must add, the Guernsey, breeds stand almost alone.

Then comes the question — What position is to be given to the subject of my paper, namely, CHOSSHRED ANIMALS ?

And I can only answer it by repeating whnt I have before said, that if butter or cheese-making is the object,

A REAL GOOD CliO'sblilU'.D COW, produced from any pure breeds yuu fancy, regarding climate and situation, if such abreed can be continued till it becomes a distiuct breed in itself, combining the two great objects we have iv view — that of quantity and quality of milk and weight of carcase — producing good beef, then I thiuk even Mr Hall would own his Jersey breed fairly beaten as a general purpose cow, and say the object he bo desires had been at last obtained.

It is no uncommon occurrence, in looking through some of our best non-pedigree herds, to hear the owner say, perhaps pointing to a somewhat unshapely cow,' showing distinct marks of crossbreeding, that she is the best and richest milker of the lot ; and on visiting cottagers, and other small owners of perhaps only one or two crossbred looking cows, to hear from them very extraordinary statements as to the amount of milk and butter they produce, but it frequently happens that these are animals lacking the size and feeding qualities that farmers think so desirable.

In pondering over in my mind much that is said and written nowadays on the subject of breeding and production, I am often led to wonder whether, after all is said and done, we have made such rapid strides as on first sight would appear in advance of former generations of farmers. In a book on agriculture by Mr Arthur Young, Secretary to the Board of Agriculture, written in the year 1799, I find the following remarks, which seem to me to bear rather aptly on this subject of the dairy. He says : — " Great exertions have boeu made of late years in improving the breed of cattle, and many experiments made to ascertain the best, but a caution is here to be given on a point too much neglected, which is, that no one breed will do for every object. The same sort of cow must not be expected to do for breeding, fattening beasts, working oxen, and the dairy too. At present I shall consider the breeds of cattle with no other view but the dairy. The shorthorn is a good milker, but reckoned to give thiii milk, such as will not yield a tlue proportion of butter, and f-ven tho quantity of milk is not always in proportion to their size. All cattle eat nearly in proportion to their weight,

and if they do not give milk in proportion to their size they are not profitable for the dairy. The Alderney is one of the best, if not the best milker we have in England — I mean, always proportioned to size. Mongrel cows are found everywhere, tho most remarkable are the Suffolk Poll and the Cheshire. Boih are little, illmade, ugly animals, but admirable milkers. Iv Cheshire they have tried the cross with fine Lancashire long-horned bulls, but have hurb the dairy by doing so. Perhaps the best dairy that could be constituted would cousist of twothirds Suffolk Polls and one-third Alderney, the milk to be mixed. The secret of having some Alderney cows with other breeds is well known and practised in Hampshire." Mr Young then goes on to give authentic cases of the yield iv butter of individual cows, ranging from 121b up to as much as 251b of butter weekly, about 2j|gal of milk to the quart of cream on an average, and producing lib of butter to each quart. If this was so in 1799 (and the whole 45 volumes I have of this work appear written on very painstaking and truthful lines.)

HOW I'AK AUK WE AHEAD in this year of grace 1892, after well nigh a century of labour and learning spent on this great dairy question, and the immense interest taken in the production of every conceivable utensil that can be made to extract the utmost milk can yield ?

The mixing of richer milk with that of poorer quality, in order that the larger fat globules of the richer might assist in taking up the smaller fat globules of the poorer milk, has of late been advanced by our scientific friends rather as a new theory or discovery, and yet it would appear it was done in 1799, although perhaps they could not have explnined quite so accurately as in the present day in wh.it way the actual benefit arose. "There is nothing new under the sun."

I will conclude my paper by asking a question, leaving it to be answered in the course of the discussion that will follow on my resuming my seat — namely, whether it is better, in the long run, to mix the breeds of cattle for the purposes of the dairy by judicious crossing, with the object of thereby producing an animal that will make both beef and butter ; or, on tbe other hand, to keep, say, two distinct pure breeds of cattle, one for size and quantity, the other for quality, and mix. tho milk after it is drawn from the cow.