THE DAIRY HERD 117 



more than half. Even if the cows are scrubs, there is no place in the herd 

 for a grade or scrub bull. Only a pure-bred bull should head a herd of 

 cows. The bull should possess quality and type and come from a long 

 line of good producing females. In order to be sure that a bull can improve 

 a good herd of cows, only tested bulls should be used. In order to test 

 a bull he should be bred when young to a few of the good cows in the herd 

 and the resulting heifer calves watched. If they are better than their 

 dams, a good herd sire is indicated. 



Professor W. J. Fraser, of the University of Illinois, calculates that 

 in a herd of thirty-five cows it costs $3 per heifer more to have them sired 

 by a pure-bred bull than by a scrub. This, then, is the total cost of pro- 

 viding each heifer calf with one good parent. If this same heifer calf 

 produces only three pounds of milk more a day than her dam, this, at 80 

 cents a hundred pounds, means that in six years of milking, for 300 days 

 a year, she would bring the owner $43 more than her dam. On this basis 

 the rate of interest on the investment is better than anything else on the 

 farm. Professor Fraser believes his figures to be conservative. 



The University of Missouri has a Jersey herd that has had the fortune 

 of having some excellent bulls at its head and the misfortune of having 

 had some sires of very poor quality. To illustrate: ten daughters from 

 Lome of Meridale, one of their bulls, would have produced in six years 

 $900 more than their dams, while ten daughters of Missouri Rooter in the 

 same time would have produced $980 less than their dams. This shows 

 that two farmers of equal ability living on farms side by side, and of the 

 same size, would differ $2000 in wealth at the end of six years with only 

 ten daughters from such different character bulls. The necessity of 

 records is seen when it is remembered that the "bull is half the herd." 



Buying Cows or Raising Calves. One cannot build up a dairy herd 

 and continue to improve it by buying cows. The only way to improve 

 a herd is by raising calves that are better than their dams. Near large 

 cities it is a common practice to buy cows to replenish the herd. In this 

 country, far from large cities, an excess of calves is raised. If all the cows 

 in this far-removed section had good records this method could continue. 

 The farmer who gets his herd free from tuberculosis and contagious abor- 

 tion can hope to keep it so, providing he raises his own calves. It can 

 never be done if he buys cows. 



The new-born calf must be well fed and made to grow. The feeding 

 of the calf undoubtedly has some effect on the later usefulness of the cow. 

 A stunted calf will never be as good a cow as though she had never been 

 stunted. 



For purposes of record it is necessary that every calf be marked before 

 being taken from its mother. This often seems unnecessary, but when 

 the young heifer spends her first summer on pasture, the owner is liable 

 to forget the particular animal unless he visits the pasture frequently, or 

 unless the heifer has some very distinguishing mark. If the habit of 



