FIFTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK — PART VI. 579 



buy pure bred or well bred animals on the farm do not know how to take 

 care of them. Scrub care means scrub animals. Does any one suppose 

 that if the elder Marr had begun with his Missies, his Princess Royals and 

 his Roan Ladys and let it go at that, not caring how they were fed or stabled 

 or how they were mated, or if he had mated with them any sort of a bull 

 that was called pure bred, he would ever have built up the magnificent herd 

 that was dispersed at Uppermill the other day? Here is the essence of this 

 proposition. The stockman can not win without definity of aim, and the 

 term means everything in mating, feeding and care. The mere acquisition 

 of various animals that have won prizes or produced prize winners in other 

 hands means little or nothing. That under certain circumstances they have 

 won prizes or have produced prize winners means only that under similar or 

 improved circumstances they will do as well. Lower the surroundings one 

 iota and the result will be shown immediately. Therefore there is absolutely 

 no sense in any farmer purchasing pure bred stock unless he has his mind 

 fully made up to give it pure bred care. This is very much of an old story, 

 but the admonition can not be too frequently repeated. This should not 

 discourage any farmer from purchasing pure bred animals. He should, 

 however, before doing so have thought the matter out carefully to the end 

 that he may be prepared to care for them properly. It is beyond question 

 that the gospel of good blood has received more persecution on account of 

 scrub fed well bred animals than on any other account. Take the grandest 

 pure bred cow that ever won a ribbon in a show ring, subject her to care 

 that would do justice to a scrub and what between the straw stack and the 

 barbwire fence her breeder would not know her in twenty-four months. Hence 

 the point is that no farmer should lightly undertake the maintenance and 

 reproduction of pure bred animals. If he has not first studied out the prin- 

 ciples governing the industry he would far better stick to his scrubs and 

 never get beyond them. 



Breed and feed go together. It has been under conditions generated by 

 high feeding and good shelter that the improvement of cattle and other farm 

 animals has been wrought, and without a continuance of such conditions 

 success can not be attained. Here is where the beneficent influence of the 

 educational factors now at work should be chiefly felt. Time and time 

 again have farmers contended that they could not afford to keep well-bred 

 animals— it cost too much, it was a rich man's game. Never was there a 

 greater fallacy, but it has been a hard one to prove and it is only the supe- 

 rior education of the rising generation that can be trusted to improve thor- 

 oughly the flocks and herds of America. The older generation of farmers 

 has for the most part proved how not to do it. The younger and rising 

 generation is learning how it is done, and there is no doubt that the more 

 young men attend the agricultural colleges the greater will become the dis- 

 tribution of pure-bred live stock on American farms. The combination of 

 the wisdom of the two generations should lay the foundation for many a 

 famous American breeding establishment. Nurtured in youth amid the hard 

 surroundings of a frontier or at least pioneer life, the elder farmers have 

 learned well the value of a dollar. According to their lights they have 

 striven under the conditions governing their locations as no generation has 

 ever striven before to gain a livelihood, make headway and do justice by 

 their families. At the present time most American farmers are prosperous. 



