Cattle Breeding

Southland Times, Issue 4499, 11 December 1882, Page 4

Cattle Breeding

Turn in .whatever direction we may. we s^e that, all the modern imp ovements ia other breeds have bpen effected by a judicious use of shorthorn blood. Tt is of course underitood by shorthorn breeders that Mr Cb tries Colling pen", in making his famous " alloy," a red polled; Galloway cow, but in la-e years the obligation has been moie than repaid. On this point a recent writer cites as noteworthy and suggestive that " whilst all authorities admit that, prior to the introduction of the shorthorn into the north, the Buchan doddies were ' rather puny creatures, always thin of flesh,' ana that' when ashorthorirbnll was mated with a small polled cow, the prodace was a black poll of the finest character;' and that 'critics have po'nted our, ;in some of the best polled animals now or recently living a tendency to approach too nearly to the square type of the shorthorn ' — all these gentlemen remain quite persuaded that the shorthorn.has had nothing todo with making the Anjrus of the present day what they are.": Nor is it altogether due to selection that the modern Herefords have changed Ihe pig-sbaped hind-quarter9 for which ibe breed was distinguished, to the square shorthorn form. The difficulty in keeping the tnarKibgsfcnd the color qaite true ia suggestivel; 1 and these occurrences teem to be met with also in the polled Angus breed. Little embryo or bldr boras have some times appeared und a tecent great prize-winning ball was distinctly-marked with a grizzle. The author of the above qobtation follows it up with the t mfrk'/tbat <f to n* it sfems as certain that the introduction of Tees water bloo^, which precoded the grrat adT«nce in reputation of the AbpMeenccttle,«lid have a snare in bring- i Ing abotit- that, advance, as it* doe3 that old j^dy Maytteird (fbnhtain head of the im--4 n»%: *ed ! Teeswater) had a longhorned con- j fl«»<«rin''-;--Vnthih£; ■* It seems to w>, is more idto|^than'the endeavor to set np what is termed a' pnre origin * for any existing breed. livery one of them represents a fusion, and a type fixed afterwards by judicious inbreed- ■ '^" j -• y::- ' ••' -

"*•*;;/ T Why i ablackemith supposed to-be a discontoUte map ? ■'BfC»U6» be wmlwayp.eitti^ oa *,