LINES OF BREEDING.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1114, 29 April 1911, Page 8

LINES OF BREEDING.

'ATJTHORITIES ON THE SUBJECT. The. question of the lines on which to breed is a debatable one. One side is put by Mr. B. "W.' Hunt, an American Jersey breeder of note. He said: — "I never bred for pedigree without performance—never bred for-beauty— never bred for colour of hair —but always with the idea of producing animals that would yield tho utmost saleable product and bring up the farm's net. to;the. highest." Then again:—"My-'observation years ago led mo not to valno the son or the daughter of a phenomenal cow or race more. ."What a breeder should prize above all'things is a high average of' excellence extending as far back as tho pedigree records." An agricultural journal published in the States comments on Mr. Hunt's statements as follows:— "There is no doubt of the soundness of Mr. Hunt's ideas. The principal difficulty, however, is that pedigree records extend mucli farther back than do records of performance. But tho true breeder, is one who breeds for a high hord average, not a few cows of phenomenal performance. His idea of not placing value on tho soil or daughter of a phenomenal cow is in accord with our own observation. Some of the sorest disappointments that have come to men have been right in this line. They have paid high figures for suph sons and daughters only to find that the cow in making her phenomenal record had nothing left to endow her progeny. Tho cow cannot burn the candle at both ends. "Prepotency, that most valuable thing in a sire, simply means a surplus of stored-up heredity in a given direction. Much safer would it be to hunt around and find tho first and second -calf of the phenomenal cow to 'which she gave birth before sho had exhausted her vitality. . . . High breeding and moderate feeding, with easy, not forced, records, should bo tho motto "with all breeders."