FARM AND DAIRY.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 249, 30 March 1915, Page 7

FARM AND DAIRY.

STANDARD OF BREEDING COW, When attention is turned to the records of the advanced registers of the diii'crent dairy breeds, a measure is discovered which will indicate in part ; what are the hereditary possibilities of the dairy cow in milk" and butter-fat production. While to the market milkman the object of these tests might only be to determine the relative profit of the animals in the herd or breed, to the constructive breeder the records have value chiefly as indicating the milking possibilities carried by a certain individual or bloodline. The test, no matter whether it be for day, week month or year, has value chiefly as indicating the cow's responsiveness to high-pressure care and her potential ability to transmit high production to her offspring. It is true that some high-testing cows will fail to produce high-testing daughters. It may be just as true that low-testing cows never produce high-testing daughters. Of course this last statement applies only to cows that have had a favorable opportunity, and not to cows that lack a high record because they have never had a chance.

There is a dispute among the different breed advocates as to what standard constitutes the best measure of a cow's innate ability at milk production. It is obvious that the breeder cannot wait until the cow's life is ended before selecting breeding stock from her, but he must find some indication that will admit of her early use in the breeding herd, if worthy. The record advocated by the majority of dairy students as being dependable is the year's production. In the Advanced Registry of the Holstein-Friesian association the ofTN cial standard is the week's production. William Gavin in his studies on the indication of profiuetion, in correlating the various standards against the yield of a cow's entire life, finds the revised maximum (the best day's record equalled or exceeded three times in the lactation period) the best index of a cow's physiological possibilities.

As a matter of fact ( almost any ol the accepted standards are good enough indications for selection, if they are properly interpreted. It is" possible that a man who studies the subject from the standpoint of the mathematical scientist would require indexes more exact than any now in popular use, but for the man whose cows are only Under optimum conditions a part of the time there are far fewer chances of error in the stnndartl than there arc in the treatment of the animal, considering each as representing the hereditary possibilities of the animal.

It is pointed out that the cow which is superior to her herdmate in a week's test is occasionally inferior in a year's test. Gavin discovered just as higli a per cent of cows in which the one snpi erior for the year's test fell below for the entire life. Popularly the market .dairyman feels' that a cow forced to a high production is likely to be worn out for regular work, whether her record be for a year, montli or week. In fact, he is more apt to look askance at the cow that has suffered under the long grind that a cow that has passed through a short test. It is wisest to recognise that no one standard is entirely reliable, but any one is reasonably accurate when used as a comparative measure for a number of cows and properly interpreted. Milk production is largelv a question of realising inherent ■possibilities, not the transmission of definite entities, such as horns or feet. As in beef production, the possibilities must be developed before they can be appreciated. What the test attempts to do is to record the possibilities of the cow. But in probably more than one-half of the oases the possibilities are not hilly realised, and in a number of cases the records may actuallv be misleading as to the cow's ability, from a physiological standpoint. As a rule the typo of test on which the least number of variable or detrimental factors are brought to bear is best. In order to measure the hereditary possibilities in themselves, the highest production in one or more shert tests pobably most nearly does justice to the cow hersfelf.. From the financial standpoint, however, this type of fc.=t may prove highly unreliable, as the fact that the cow has to oxiist in rclat'en to her milker, feeder or owner ma'«s it inoperative that the time tv. long enough for the individual peculiarities of management to be register.; 1 on tl e cow's production. For dairy pvo'it, the factor of man and cow are inseparable. From the breeding viewpoint, tho (ow's hereditary possibilities anly wdi rass to the next generation. When '-hiiiking of the cow's contribution to the good milkers of the future, it is rather unjust to charge personal human deficiencies against her.—F.NYW. in the Chicago Breeders' Gazette.

CLAIMS OF THE TROTTER. IGNOKED IN T THE SHOW RISC. The relative qualities of the thoroughbred and totling-horsc w»r: discussed at the annual meeting of the Waikato A. and P. Association tit Hamilton en Thursday, when Mr H. K. 'iVi-a-rnm suggested that "a" section should be added to the schedule for trotting horses. At present, he said, the judg's had cyr-.-, for nothing but the thoroughbred, so that if a trotter was entered in a roadster class (being eligible for no oth?r) the award, where a thoroughbred wa' also entered, was always given to tin .'alter, though it was by no means the better horse, and compared with a good trotter, was not really a roadster at all. It seemed to the speaker that t'n} present day judge saw no further than a racehorse, —long, lanky, weak-hacked things—for the whole lot of why.a lie would not exchange one good trot tor. The speaker moved a resolution in the direction indicated, which was seconded by Mr W. E. Goodwin. Mr T. Hinton said the men educated to the thoroughbred type viewed the trotter in the light that My Tristram described the thoroughbred. It was held by certain members of the Association that the jumping classes had in the past been overdone to the detriment of other sections of the. show. He contended, however, that the ring events had been instrumental in bringing some of the finest hordes in the Dominion to the show, while last year the donations and entry fees amunntcd to £75 13s, and the expenses of the ring events to £73, showing a not profit'of £2 13s. The previous year this section showed a net profit of £33 10s. Mr Tristram's motion was carried nnanimouslv.