No. 7. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 647 



I have a neighbor, a bright keen German dairy farmer. He biiys 

 every four or five years, the best registered Guernsey bull calf he can 

 find to replace his old ball in a year or so. He pays handsome prices 

 for his bulls and he will not buy a cheap animal. Mind you his herd 

 is nearly all grade cows. He is a fine calf raiser and sells annually 

 from 8 to 10 prime young heifers and yearlings for from |25 to $40 

 each, and he has quic-k sale for all he can produce. He will tell you 

 every time that the great factor of success with him is the high qual- 

 ity of the bull he keeps. Don't you think his advanced ideas pay him 

 better than as though he had no such ideas? He lives on a rented 

 farm of 171 acres and he gives cash receipts of the farm in butter, 

 cream, hogs, poultry, young cattle, etc., to the amount of |4,000 an- 

 nually and he has half of it. Don't you think it pays him to practice 

 advanced ideas of farming? 



THE MATTER OF BREED. 



It is a common thing to hear men say: *'Pay no attention to the 

 matter of breed in cows. What you want is a cow that will do busi- 

 ness at the pail." That sort of talk is very superficial. The question 

 of breed is a very important one. The farmers of Minnesota fol- 

 lowed Prof. Shaw for years and as he told them, selected beef bred 

 bulls to breed "dual purpose" cows for dairy work. They found at 

 last, to their sorrow, that they were getting the losing end of the 

 bargain. Their cows were failures as dairy animals. Hoard's 

 Dairyman warned them against the practice, and anybody who had 

 an understanding of the ettects of breed on feed, could have told them 

 the same. For years the farmers of Iowa have been advised the same 

 thing. All the forces of agricultural education were put in requisi- 

 tion to hold them to the "dual purpose" idea. But the cows result- 

 ing from such breeding are not, as a rule, economic dairy animals. 



The Iowa farmers, those of them who are looking into the thing, 

 are finding that with such cows, they are losing more at the pail than 

 they are making in beef. And so they are getting around. Hoard's 

 Dairyman has for years preached this doctrine: If you want milk you 

 must breed for it, and breed for it specifically. 



Mistakes in breeding are a long time in making themselves felt. 

 Hence the importance to every farmer that he should have correct 

 ideas as to the principles of breeding. No wonder that he is con- 

 fused when well-known teachers and breeders juggle with these 

 principles. It is as though one said, "Twice two is either three or 

 five just as yon want it." Yes, there is a great deal in breed. We 

 once heard a story of a ''dual purpose" man who went to hire out as 

 a teacher of a country district school. The clerk asked him a few 

 questions among which was this: "Is the earth round or flat?" 

 "Well," said the man, "I teaches 'em both ways, just what they 

 want." 



A great many farmershave wanted "dual purpose" cows if they 

 could ^et them. They called for that kind of teaching and they got 

 it. But it was wrong, and they are findiu<r it out in the last analysis 

 of real practical results, at the pail. The farmers who stayed by the 

 dairy bred cow are winning by it. Yes! there is a good deal in breed. 

 I spoke of the effect of breed on feed. There is a great mystery 

 here, that no man has solved. Here stands a bale of hay. On one 

 side is a cow; on the other is a sheep, on the other a horse. In one 



