'374 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



Tassed in determining what weight should be attached to the facts gathered. In 

 the human race, incestuous progeny are always the offspring of parents morallyi 

 and often physically depraved. On the other hand, the very best and most perfect 

 animals are the ones selected for inter-breeding. From such animals, even if it be 

 admitted that iu-aud-in-breeding injured the progeny, it would take generations to 

 reduce them to a level with the "common herd." 



If we could have the full history of every in-and-in-bred animal, and there are 

 thousands of them in this country, and a like history of an equal number of ani- 

 mals produced by breeding together the best animals of families as far removed in 

 Jdnship as it was possible to find, we would then have the data from which we 

 might draw approximately correct conclusions. Such statistics must be gathered, 

 if at aU, through societies like this; for otherwise they would not be of sufficient 

 •extent to be of any considerable utility. 



Can not our Society start the matter, and provide for a report from all its mem- 

 bers upon this as well as upon other important matters connected with Jersey 

 breeding and butter production? The statistics of cross-breeding can easily be 

 started by sending one of your best cows to the best bull of some other family to be 

 found among our members, and then taking the calves to another first-class animal 

 of some different family. The cows first bred should then be in-bred, and the re- 

 sults compared with the results of the first trial. 



The report of the test should cover all the calves dropped, or it can not be of 

 much value. 



Although the fortunate owners of remarkable animals have practiced in-and- 

 in-breeding, and built up, very often, thorough family blood, yet we have no com- 

 plete history of any of these families. The cows that produce from two to four 

 pounds of butter per day, are well advertised, but what of the hundreds of others 

 of which we hear nothing? We want the yearly butter yield of these animals as 

 well. 



Mary Anne of St. Lambert, 9770, made 838 pound of butter in 310 days; 

 Eurotas, No. 2154, 778 pounds in 341 days; Jersey Queen of Barnett, A. H. B. 4201, 

 made 8ol pounds in 365 days. That kind of a record is of more value than one of 

 four pounds per day for seven days, if the record stops there. 



Mr. J. H. Walker, of Worcester, Mass , has rendered a valuable service by giv- 

 ing the butter yield of a number of each of the families represented in his herd. 

 But these statistics of inbred cattle should also report as to the vital powers of each 

 calf. How many die; of what disease? Is there any scrofula or other constitu- 

 tional disorder produced? Are the animals dwarfed or deformed, or is any cross 

 disposition or bad temper developed? Do they become so refined that a thunder 

 storm will sour the milk in the udder, or that the firing of a gun will diminish the 

 secretion for days? Have they a vigor of constitution that enables them to hold 

 up all the year, or do they succeed only during the test week, and thereafter remain 

 out of repair for the season? 



May it not be a fact, after all, that we could start with even inferior animals, 

 -and by using the same care in selecting crosses out of other families, arrive at 

 greater results if we only kept the record as carefully, and were as anxious for its 

 publication ? 



