308 BOARD OF AGEICULTDKE. 



I think the resolution before this body ought to be passed. Of course 

 the Short-horn Breeders' Association is a representative body and want 

 to do what the short-horn breeders of the country want them to do, so 

 fas as is consistent and right. They want to laiow what you thinli, and I 

 believe a resolution of this kind might very properly be passed. That 

 is a step, and it shows to the association publishing the herd book that 

 you no longer think it the proper thing to refer to some old imported 

 cow fifteen crosses back. 



Mr. Robbins: In order to more properly get this before the meeting, 

 1 move the adoption of Mr. Quick's resolution. (Seconded.) 



Mrs. Meredith: I do not approve of the resolution and I shall vote 

 against it. I say this with great hesitancy in the presence of those who 

 have had more experience than I have had. We must remember that a 

 ped.igree is a purely artificial thing. If we put aside the imported cow 

 what better have we to suggest? The pedigrees must be traced somehow 

 in order to make it a good, standard short-horn pedigree. What better 

 have -you to suggest than the imported cow? We must admit that the 

 association on the other side takes great pains to keep the record of the 

 eligibility of the cow. I wonder how many here remember those two 

 little thin books on "Unfashionable Crosses." Were they not dreadful 

 things? Now, if we do this we will find there will be a standard and 

 somebody will get up books like these little volumes on "Unfashionable 

 Crosses." 



Senator Harris: I am interested in what Mrs. Meredith says, and I 

 should consider it a very great disaster if anything so absolutely horrible 

 as a revival of Haley's "Unfashionable Crosses" should be brought about. 

 This would not do it. This does not take anything out of the herd book 

 or admit anything into it, but simply does away Avith a little underscor- 

 ing we are in the habit of using. The information is all in the herd book. 

 You still have all the information you need in the herd book, but you do 

 away with the artificial distinction I spoke of. It is always interesting 

 to know the history of every importation. Nothing I know of is more 

 interesting than Mr. Warfield's History of Imported Cows. That is still 

 of record, but we no longer recognize the importance of the imported cow. 

 That is, we no longer give an undue proportion of value to the imported 

 cow in the pedigree. To that extent it puts things more upon a level and 

 gives the tabulated pedigree a chance to become more popular. Of course 

 lack of space prohibits the association publishing tabulated pedigrees. 



President Bowen: The resolution, if passed, will not bind the Amer- 

 ican Association at all. You have the registration of the animal, but in 

 place of tracing to some Imported animal it gives the information to the 

 party that the animal has the blood of that noted animal in it. That 

 is all that tracing to the imported cow does now. 



