742 CYCLOPEDIA OF LIVE STOCK AND COMPLETE STOCK DOCTOR. 



wherever used they have been greatly liked. CaretuI selection has done 

 much to keep down their fattening qualities on full feed, and it is prob- 

 able that there is no strictly dairy cow that to-day combines so many 

 good qualities as the Ayrshire cow. 



X. Points of Ayrshire Cattle. 



Dr. G. Lewis Sturtevant, of Massachusetts, a scientific investigator, 

 and careful farmer, who has given particular attention to the characteris- 

 tics and breeding of Ayrshire cattle in New England, minutely describes 

 the points of Ayrshire cattle. With slight variations the same rules will 

 apply to the Dutch or Holstcin cattle to be hereafter noticed : 



The usefulness of the dairy cow is in her udder, and toward the udder, 

 its shape and its yield, all the capabilities of the cow should be directed. 

 We may first view it as a reseiwoir for the milk. As such, it must be 

 large and capacious, with broad foundations, extending well behind and 

 well forward, with distinct attachments ; broad and square, viewed from 

 behind, the sole level and broad, the lobes even-sized, and teats evenly 

 distributed ; the whole udder firmly attached, with skin loose and elastic. 

 Such a form gives great space for the secreted milk, and for the lodgment 

 of the glands, while allowing the changes from an empty to a full vessel. 

 The glands should be free from lumps of fat and muscle, well set up in 

 the body when the cow is dry, and loosely covered with the soft and elastic 

 skin, without trace of flabbiness. Such a covering allows for extension 

 when the animal is in milk, while the glands are kept in proximity with 

 the blood-vessels that supply them. 



XI. Escutcheon or Milk Mirror. 



1 think a broad escutcheon is fully as good a sign as a long one ; tha 

 quantity or quality mean more than shape, j^et I would not discard th 

 shape entirely. The udder and its dependencies, the milk veins, and the 

 escutcheon mark, may be considered the foundation of the Ayrshire cow. 

 These influence profit, and also the shapes of the body and the form of 

 the animal. The milk vessel as placed in the pubic region of the cow, 

 ind is protected on either side by the hind limbs. The breadth of its 

 attachments secures breadth of body, and the weight requires also a depth 

 of quartei and of flanks. The breadth below requires breadth of hip 

 above, and length of loin here appears related to length of pelvis. So 

 much for the physical portion. The physical function of milk-producing 

 demaads a great and continuous flow of blood, for it must not be for- 

 gotten that milk is blood, so to speak. This flow is dependent on the 

 supply of food, and on the facilities of digestion. To gain this, a large 

 body is required m order to hold the suitable digestive organs. To gain 

 the most of our blood after it has absorbed the chyle from the digestive 



