A DEFECT OF HAIR AND TEETH IN 



CATTLE -PROBABLY HEREDITARY' 



Leon J. Cole 



University of Wisconsin 



IN THE spring of 1918 Prof. Arthur 

 H. Kuhlman, of the State College, 

 Brookings, S. D., at that time 

 Agricultural Demonstration Agent 

 at Juneau, Wis., brought to my atten- 

 tion an interesting case of dental de- 

 ficiency in cattle. This was in a herd 

 of purebred Holstein-Friesians near 

 Juneau, and a short time later I was 

 able to visit the place with Mr. Kuhlman 

 and to secure some photographs and 

 notes relating to the case. As the 

 condition appears to be unusual, and 

 as it shows evidence of being hereditary, 

 it seems worth while to put it on record. 

 The defect was first noticed when 

 some of the calves born early in 1918 

 were being taught to drink by putting 

 the fingers in their mouths for them to 

 suck. It was discovered in this way 

 that three of them did not have well- 

 formed teeth in front like normal 

 calves. Furthermore, these same calves 

 had a peculiar deficiency of hair, which 

 will be mentioned more in detail later. 

 The discovery of this condition in the 

 calves recalled the fact that the bull 

 which sired them had, when about a 

 year old, been turned out on pasture 

 with other cattle, and that he had 

 grown thin while the others remained in 

 good flesh. An examination was ac- 

 cordingly made of his m.outh, leading 

 to the discovery that instead of the 

 normal complement of four well-formed 

 incisor teeth on each side, in the front of 

 the lower jaw, he had only three small, 

 imperfect teeth on the left side and two 

 correspondingly small ones on the right. 

 These were so small as to be practically 

 useless for cropping grass, which readily 

 explained the bull's failure to do well 



on pasture. As may be seen, however, 

 from Fig. 6, he was a well-developed, 

 fine appearing animal. It was not 

 practicable to secure a picture of his 

 mouth showing the teeth. 



This bull had been purchased of 

 another breeder, and was coming three 

 years of age at the time of our visit. 

 Until his mouth was examined, it was 

 not known that he was in any way 

 imperfect or abnormal. The dams of 

 the calves, so far as known, all had 

 normal dentition. 



Of the three defective calves of 1918, 

 one had two small teeth on the left 

 and one on the right, the second had 

 one very small tooth on the left and 

 one small one on the right, while the 

 third (shown in Fig. 7) had two conical 

 teeth on each side, the back ones being 

 very small while those in front were 

 larger but round and blunt. The 

 contrast with the normal dentition in a 

 calf of this age may be readily seen by 

 comparing this figure with Fig. 8. 

 Here the four sharp, well-developed 

 teeth are plainly discernible. 



Associated with the deficiency of 

 teeth there was also a deficiency of hair. 

 This was said to be quite noticeable 

 in the very young calves, especially on 

 the head and neck. The hair was not 

 entirely lacking on these parts, but 

 was very short, giving a semi-denuded 

 appearance. Later in life the coat 

 appears to be practically normal. At 

 the age at which our photographs were 

 taken the difference was easily notice- 

 able, but it does not, unfortunately, 

 stand out very clearly in the pictures. 

 By careful scrutiny, however, it may be 

 observed that the head and upper neck 



'Papers from the Department of Genetics, Agricultural Experiment Station, University 

 of Wisconsin, No. 19. Published with the approval of the Director of the Station. 



303 



