64 DUAL-PURPOSE CATTLE 



will instantly transform the evil of one year into the perfection 

 of the next is impossible; for a decade, which represents rather 

 less than three generations of stock-rearing, is the least period 

 by which improvement in farm-stock can be measured. 



Twenty-five years' observation of farming before the war 

 showed me that apart from robbing the land by running store- 

 stock upon it, there were, with certain exceptions, only two 

 ways of getting a decent living from the cattle industry. 



The first was growing and selling milk (generally to those 

 living in towns) for consumption in its primitive form. The 

 conditions under which this could be carried on profitably were 

 by no means universal and not always continuous. To ensure 

 success it was essential for the farmer to be favourably situated 

 as regards transport, to have a special water-supply connected 

 with his holding, and to be able to secure milkers. These 

 conditions were by no means universal, but at a time when other 

 farming operations offered but little promise of a decent reward 

 for enterprise, they were common enough to encourage a supply 

 that was often at least as great as the demand. This led to a 

 frequent fall in the value of milk, which was practically the only 

 monopoly the British and Irish farmer could produce. The 

 price, indeed, often fell so low that only by rigid economy, not 

 to say parsimony, could it be produced with any hope of profit; 

 in fact, the prices prevailing in some years were such as to 

 make one marvel how the farmers who produced it kept going 

 at all. One very easy form of economy was to buy a very inferior 

 bull to mate with the cows. This was a very insidious form of 

 false economy, for many of the milk-selling farmers did no 

 rearing at all. The majority, in fact, sold off their calves at 

 from three to seven days old. They looked upon breeding as a 

 necessary evil; had they been able to keep the cows in profit 

 without the trouble of producing calves, it would have suited 

 them well. That the heifer calves had to grow on and make the 

 future milkers did not immediately concern them, and so they 

 were responsible for the gradual deterioration of a very large 

 proportion of the cow-stock of the country. This was a short- 

 sighted and disastrous policy, not only from the national point 

 of view, but from their own. For such a large proportion of all 



