352 AGRICULTURE OF MAINE. 



to get a line on his bulls. Sometimes it might be possible to 

 buy a tested bull, that the owner would sell to avoid inbreeding, 

 but the man who is really afraid of inbreeding will usually 

 turn off his bull before he knows anything about him, and 

 then gamble on another untried youngster, so you would be 

 no better off by buying such a bull, unless you have an oppor- 

 tunity to learn from the owner's records, within a year or two, 

 the performance of the bull's daughters, thus saving a year or 

 two that would be lost if you bought a young bull to test out 

 for yourself. It is not advisable to buy an aged bull to test, 

 because his age will put an end to his usefulness too soon after 

 you have proved him. 



Question: What is your own idea about inbreeding? 



Answer: I do not consider inbreeding as inbreeding of any 

 value whatever, but if a man has judgment and inbreeds vigor- 

 ous stock, he can perpetuate a strong family. If you breed out 

 all the time, you will dissipate what good blood you have. If 

 you have healthy animals I do not consider it is dangerous. 

 You cannot do anything without judgment, whether }'ou are 

 breeding in or out. 



Question : How long do you feed skim-milk to your calves? 



Answer : It depends on how much we have available ; 

 sometimes to six to eight months old, sometimes to a year old. 

 Sometimes we have fed it to the milking cows. It is good feed. 

 If you have milk to spare you can substitute it for part of 

 your grain, at least. We can get three one-half cents per gal- 

 lon for our skim-milk, and then the grain would be cheaper. 



Question : Do you think it would be possible to raise good 

 calves without milk? 



Answer : I never tried it, and I would not want to try it. 



Question: What is the cost of your basic ration? 



Answer: We don't have any. Every cow gets a different 

 ration. We go to the individual cow to see what she needs. 

 Some cows won't take all kinds of feed, and will not give good 

 results on certain feeds, so we make out a ration of bran, cot- 

 tonseed, gluten and corn meal, and frequently it will be some- 

 where near equal parts, but we try to keep the cows in uniform 

 condition. Some cows will put everything into the pail and 

 some will put the feed all on their backs. 



