HERD TESTING

Waipa Post, Volume XXIV, Issue 1661, 10 September 1925, Page 6

HERD TESTING

SOME COMMENTS BY MR ANDREW

KAY.

THE OLD MISSION COW.

Mr Andrew Kay, of Orakau, is known far and wide throughout the Waikato as a most entertaining contributor to the fund of knowledge bearing on the early history of the Waikato, he having resided here fof well over half a century. His latest contribution is a commentary on the subject of herd testing. He writes:— A good deal of the publicity given to the need for herd testing is purely advertising of particular herds, and there is also a lot written about the dangers of using a “scrub” bull. T venture to say that none of the glib writers could tell a scrub bull at isighl (With the greatly advanced knowledge of testing nswadays, my frank opinion is that if some of these learned men wouild give their attention to accurately testing the merits of - the bulls at the head of dairy herds the alleged deficiencies of *the cow might well be left severely alone. To my personal observation, the average milking cow has been deterioratng for the last sixty years. Before the Waikato War there was a type of clow that was known amongst the Maoris as the “missionary cow.” One such would supply the whole village with milk, besides rearing her calf. As one of the natives once remarked, one of those cows would fill a milk can instead of an ordinary bucket. As to how that grand type of animal, the mission cow, deteriorated in milkgiving qualities, the following is a fair example: Some fifty or sixty years ago there was imported into Napier a high-priced Shorthorn pedigree bull. I believe it cost most than £IOOO. This partciular animal was mated with the cows in the district, and all his male progeny went to the stud. When his heifers came to profit they did not give enough milk to feed their own calves. In my considered opinion, that high-priced imported bull was the “scrub” bull and all his progeny were scrubs likewise. I recall that in the period when skimming factories were operating in the Te Awamutu district, a farmer, Mr E, Bridgman, milked by hand a small herd of cows. He was particular about always having a high-class bull at the head of his herd, and he only retained and reared about half-a-dozen heifer calves annually from his best cows. When one bevy of those selected heifer calves came to profit there was only one that proved to be worth the labour of milking her—and she was accidentally begot by a neighbour’s allegedly scrub bull. The writer hunted up that scrub bull and found, after repeated trials, that he was unfortunately sterile. A one-time fairly general method of testing was to send a few sample bottles of each cow’s milk to the local factory, where an expert did the testing. To my knowledge, a neighbour, by way of a joke or for mere curiosity, filled all the sample bottles from one cow’s milk. No two of those test samples were alike, and they ranged in butterfat content from 3 to 5 per cent. A short while ago an Ohaupo farmer proclaimed in the press that he had achieved by testing. It was claimed that he was milking fifteen -cows, and that he culled the four worst, with the resujt that the remaining elevengave more butterfat than did the original fifteen. A god test of worth is the factory cheques. It was reported the other day that Mr J. Walker, of Orakau, had secured a return of £25 per cow from his herd of eighty for the past season, and the press comment/ was that it was a pity the owner had neglected to test each individual cow. I will conclude with .the comment that the great Scottish Milking Shorthorn breeders in the Dabalara district of Australia tak no risk of lowering the butterfat standard of their herds, rigidly adhering to the practice of never buying a bull—they breed their own. The Darbalara strain is world-renowned.