SHORTHORNS AS BEEF PRODUCERS.

Sun (Christchurch), Volume I, Issue 41, 25 March 1914, Page 11

SHORTHORNS AS BEEF PRODUCERS.

Under this heading Mr Robert Bruce contributes a refreshing article to the "Live Stock Journal." He says:— "All cattle breders will be ready to acknowledge that Shorthorns have been the first and greatest factor in the improvement of the herds of beef cattle beyond the seas. When, towards the close of the eighteenth century the farmers and cattle breeders in the valley of Tees became imbued with a spirit of emulation concerning the matter of cattle improvement, they could never have believed that the breed they had set themselves to improve would be called upon to fulfil a world-wide mission which has done so much for the welfare of the people in all meat consuming countries of the world. I have said that Shorthorns have been the first and principal factor in the improvement of beef-producing cattle in all exporting countri«, and as a confirmation of this would refer to the case of the Argentine Republic, from which at the present day we draw the large proportion of our beef imports. When we consider that it is not many years since cattle in the Argentine were slaughtered for their skins and such fat as they possessed, we are led to realise that the improvement that has taken place in the quantity and quality of the meat now imported from that rich agricultural c0untry —6,594,895 cwt in 1912, is almost altogether due to Shorthorns which left pur shores,^