<s. 



California Agriculturist and Live Stock Journal. 



sheep, the ewes of one, when crossed during 

 successive generations with Merino rams, 

 yielded up their characters far sooner than the 

 ewes of the other. In other words, the pre- 

 potency of the Merino rams was greater in the 

 one case than in the other; which necessitates 

 this conclusion, that prepotency is the excess 

 of the power of iranimissioii which one parent 

 has over the other. It is evident that each 

 parent tends, with a certain force, to transmit 

 its characters, and it wUl transmit them un- 

 less the force is met by one superior to it. It 

 is simply a matching of force against force, 

 the stronger force winning here as elsewhere. 



Keferring again to the examples given by 

 Darwin. In South America there is a breed 

 of cattle called the Niata breed, with certain 

 marked peculiarities. " When these are 

 crossed with common cattle, though the Niata 

 breed is prepotent whether males or females 

 are used, yet the prepotency is str(»ngest in 

 the female line. In making reciprocal crosses 

 of Pouter and Fantail pigeons, the Pouter 

 seems to bo prepotent, through both sexes, 

 over the Fantail. " These examples will per- 

 haps be sufficient to show that the transmis- 

 sion of peculiar character is due to some 

 power or force in one or the other of the pa- 

 rents, and not that one parent invariably 

 transmits certain characters and the other 

 certain others. 



It appears to be a plan of nature, in both 

 the animal and vegetable kingdoms, that in 

 fertilization, the sexual cells shall come from 

 difl'erent organisms. The various arrange- 

 ments in orchidaceous plants are the most 

 ■well-known examples of this, but it is now 

 known that in many other orders of plants 

 simpler, but equally eflective means are pro- 

 vided for securing cross-fertilization, and it is 

 the opinion of the best vegetable physiologists 

 that this cross-fertilization is the rule, and 

 that cases of continual or habitual self-fertil- 

 ization are quite rare. In the higher animals, 

 the individuals are divided into two groups — ■ 

 in the one, the male sexual cells are developed, 

 and in the other, the female cells. The re- 

 sult of a fertilization in such a case must al- 

 ways be a sort of cross — each animal possess- 

 ing its individual peculiarities. In the lower 

 forms, where both kinds of sexual organs are 

 found in the same individual, it might be sup- 

 posed that no such cross-fertilization existed, 

 but even here it is foiind that fertilization 

 takes place by the congress of two of these 

 hermaphrodite individuals — each fertilizing 

 the other. — Prof. C. E. Jiessey, Cal. College of 

 Ayncalture. 



A Stampede on the Plains. — There is one 

 thing about cattle very hard to understand, 

 even by those who are most intimately ac- 

 quainted with their habits, and that is, why 

 they wiU stampede — suddenly become uncon- 

 trollable — lose all their senses, and " like 

 mad" tear away in whatever direction they 

 may get started until coraiiletely exhausted. 

 Some writer in the Journal of Agriculture thus 

 relates his own experience while crossing the 

 plains to California in 1858: 



This drive was the longest and hardest I 

 remember to have seen during the entire trip. 

 The morning of the day we made this drive 

 WB broke corral some time before daylight; 

 there was not a drop of water in the entire 

 twenty-five miles; the country traveled over 

 ■was very hilly, and the day hot and sultry. 

 Wo went into corral near the North Platte, 

 about one o'clock the next morning. 



After corral had been made, the oxen had 

 hardly been unyoked when the entire drove, 

 probably maddened by thirst, took one of 

 those terrific stampedes which used to be so 

 well known on the Plains, and for ■n-hich it 

 was often so dilHeult to account. They broke 

 straight for the river, jumped into it and 

 made for the other side. Frank and I were 

 already on our mules, bare-back and with 

 raw-hide halters, and after a word or two wo 



agreed to follow them, he going above, and I 

 below the cattle. 



The bottom of the Platte is as changeable 

 and capricious as the fluctuations of stock or 

 the gymnastics of a jack-rabbit. Owing to 

 the quicksand formation of its bed, the bottom 

 is a regular map of hills and holes; one mo- 

 ment the water may not be a foot deep, and 

 the next a horse and rider may be plunging 

 and floundering much beyond their depth. I 

 kept down the stream for a distance and then 

 forced my mule over its bank. 



The night was very dark and I could see 

 nothing at all; but the cattle could be heard 

 puffing and splashing in the water. I directed 

 my course down stream, my mule alternately 

 wading and s^wimming, as long as I could 

 hear any of them below me. I went down 

 this way for nearly a mile and then headed 

 for the north bank; but when I reached it my 

 mule was so worn out and the bank so steep 

 that I could not persuade him to climb it — 

 though my persuader was an excellent one, 

 being a heavy, sharp Mexican spur with a 

 rowler about two inches in diameter. I knew 

 that the mu!e could attend to himself, so I 

 climbed out and left him to go it on his own 

 account. 



Of course I could see nothing of the cattle, 

 and being very effectually played out and in a 

 somewhat reckless mood anyhow, I laid down 

 and went to sleep immediately — strongly un- 

 der the impression that the cattle at the mo- 

 ment were on their way to the Brithish Pos- 

 sessions, and not a particle troubled as to how 

 soon they got there. 



It was nearly sunrise when I woke up, and 

 the sight that met my eyes after a little obser- 

 vation was as soul-cheering a one as ever 

 gladdened the heart of a bull-whacker. Above 

 me was the entire herd of cattle grazing 

 quietly, and not two hundred yards below 

 was my mule. Mounting him I soon found 

 Frank. He, too, had been sleeping, but had 

 managed to keep above the cattle, and he and 

 his mule had kept together throughout. We 

 rode through the herd, and there was not a 

 steer missing. The river had cooled their 

 stampeding ardor, and when they had reached 

 the bank they were willing enough to stop 

 for a rest. 



First and last, in my experience upon the 

 plains and in the Rocky Mountains, I have 

 seen a good many stampedes among cattle.but 

 never one that ended so pleasantly and harm- 

 lessly. Generally speaking there is but little 

 fun in them. Steers on a stampede seem to 

 be entirely insensible to all arguments of en- 

 treaty or coercion. They will run over any- 

 thing from a prairie dog town to a regiment 

 of U. S. troops. Gen. Harney was proverbi- 

 al for his management of Indians, but even 

 he could never have stopped a herd of cattle 

 on a stampede. When »airly under headway, 

 I verily believe that if the Flag of our Union 

 (long may it w-a-a-a-ve!) or the Constitution 

 of the United States was placed before them, 

 they would'ntpay any more attention to one, 

 or both, than if they were the National Con- 

 gress convened in regular session to consider 

 the Louisiana troubles. They will run from 

 fifteen to twenty miles, and even farther, go- 

 ing straight on, through or over everything in 

 their way, until they are at last compelled to 

 stop from utter exhaustion. Under such cir- 

 cumstances they have no more sense than a 

 Piute Indian, or acoh)red member of a South- 

 ern Legislature. Then the work of gathering 

 them up — one has to have gone through it to 

 get a proper appreciation. They scatter in a 

 nuiimer most sad and painful to contemjilate, 

 and when being driven back to camp seem to 

 realize a most malicious pleasure in wishing 

 to go in any and every direction save the one 

 intended. 'Oxen are not the most charming 

 creatures in the world, even when acting their 

 loveliest, but on and afti'r a stampede they 

 are particularly and unreasonably despicable 

 and detestable. 



get. If we breed a multitude of qualities in 

 an animal, that multitude shows more or less 

 of its qualities. If we breed a single quality 

 in an animal representing it we get this. This 

 then is safe, and we know what we have to 

 do. There is a ditference, for instance, in 

 Short-horns. Some breed more largely — that 

 is, some strains do — for milk than others. 

 These have been cultivated to that end. We 

 therefore use them, and with success, in the 

 dairy. Here we have beef and the milking 

 property united. This, in the EngUsh dairies, 

 prevails to a large extent; also to some extent 

 in this country. If we wish a family cow,one 

 only, we select a large milker from the Jersey 

 breed. We select a large milker because there 

 is never a lack of richness of quality in this 

 breed. It transmits faithfully this one valu- 

 able property. In breeding the Jersey, there- 

 fore, for improvement, care must be had for 

 the quantity rather than the quality of the 

 milk. If this can be secured — and that it can 

 there is no doubt — the Jersey \vill be the only 

 cow for the dairy. Beef at the end of the 

 term of milking will be no object then, as the 

 superiority in the milking quality will more 

 than balance the advantage of beef. And so 

 it is now with our best milkers. It is an ob- 

 ject to keep for milk alone with these. They 

 may be used for milk alone, and the carcass 

 given away, and still be an advantage over 

 the beef-producing animal. 



A Colorado cattle-breeder 9,000 feet above 

 the sea finds it more profitable to raise Short- 

 horns than Texan or other common breeds. 

 They do equally well on the native pasturage 

 without other feed, and bring much more 

 clear money, and are less liable to wander 

 away and scatter before the storms. He con- 

 demns the scrub breeds, and claims that the 

 Short-horns are as hardy as any and vastly 

 more profitable. 



The Cow fob the Daiuy. — An exchange 

 says; It is notorious that as vo breed ao we 



EVERGKEENS AS A W^INTEB PROTECTION IN 



THE SoDTH.— It is perhaps not generally 

 known how much protection is afforded to 

 tender vegetation by the presence of hardy 

 evergreens, either as hedges to screen from 

 cold and drying winds, or by their overhang- 

 ing branches to arrest excessive radiation of 

 heat. It is astonishing, sometimes, to see 

 what apparently trifling protection will save 

 the Ufe of plants which are sure to be killed 

 in more open and exposed places. A few 

 dried bushes or a handful of leaves, a shel- 

 tered fence corner or the shade of a large 

 tree, will often suffice to carry tender plants 

 safely through the winter. A few green pine 

 boughs set upright around some Eucalyptus 

 trees in two of my nrighbor's gardens have 

 have effectually saved them this winter. The 

 protection afforded by a mass of evergreen 

 foliage seems to be something more than a 

 mere screen, or what would be att'orded by an 

 overhanging shed or dried straw. Perhaps 

 the living leaves may modify the temperature 

 in some way we are ignorant of. Certain it 

 is, that many half-hardy plants ■will survive 

 the severe cold of winter when thus protected, 

 which are almost invariably killed when out 

 in perfectly exposed localities. — liural Caro- 

 linian. 



The Atnencan AgricuUurhi says the rich far- 

 mers are those who raise grass and roots, and 

 produce stock or butter and cheese, and make 

 manure enough to raise occusional big crops 

 of grain. The poor farmers are those ■who 

 depend on corn and wheat alone. 



*-•-* 



A recent report on "Paper making as con- 

 ducted in Western Massachusetts," contains 

 a list of 112 difl'erent materials for making 

 paper, from all of which an article of fair 

 quality can be produced. 



Not an untimely suggestion, that the Fourth 

 of July be postponed one mouth this year, on 

 "account of the weather." 



