The Regional Problem 81 



I should have bred her. This seems to take the 

 beginning back to about twenty years ago. 



This heifer's dam was an Irish " common " cow, 

 but a very good one, and the sire was a pure red 

 poll. Why the black polls, any of them, should 

 be crossed with the shorthorn in a country like 

 Ireland, while the red can be found, is more than 

 I can ever make out. The black can add neither 

 beef nor hardiness unless at the expense of milk, 

 but the red can. In size, conformity, colour, 

 milk and other important matters the red is less 

 extremely removed from the shorthorn type and 

 you can count with fair certainty on the result. 

 In crossing the Aberdeen, you can count on 

 nothing but an increase in beef, a fall in milk and 

 an undesirable number of violent reversions from 

 the meeting of too far distant extremes. Is this 

 good policy for a dairying people, poor in means 

 and rich in children ? There are places where the 

 creameries, assisted by the Aberdeen Angus, have 

 left the children crying for milk. 



My heifer, in calf to a pure shorthorn, was a 

 beauty, with a large sirloin, large quarters, great 

 depth, a right bag and a big eye ; a heavy animal, 

 yet light of movement, with every limb so 

 accurately set that you could see a clear space 

 between them when she walked. 



Her calf came, happily a heifer, but hornless, 

 with only one hornless individual on the male side 

 of the known pedigree, and none on the female 

 side, except as his result. The calf set me 

 thinking of Mendel, and other calves in the line 



