may seem desirable to milk for the monthly cream check. The 

 skim milk can be fed to the calves, which later, as feeders, with 

 a minimum of attention will be profitably converting the farm 

 roughages into meat and manure, increasing both the farm's 

 income and the fertility of the land. The value of the Shorthorn 

 as a profitable consumer of roughages is well known, which is a 

 great point in their favor, now that grain feeds are not so readily 

 available. The Shorthorn, by reason of its natural digestive 

 capacity, obtains the greatest value from its feed and produces 

 well with a minimum of grain. 



The greatest profits from dairying are only realized from a 

 breed which is naturally fecund, for successful dairying depends 

 upon the normal annual freshening of the cow. The strength 

 and ruggedness of the Shorthorn enable them to breed readily 

 and regularly and at the same time give a profitable flow of milk. 



As is seen by a study of records, Milking Shorthorns com- 

 pare very favorably with any dairy breed as milk producers. In 

 fact, Milking Shorthorns made more advanced registry records 

 in the first eight years of their official testing than did the Hoi- 

 stein and the Ayrshire in the first 16 years of their testing. The 

 Shorthorn records, too, have been made on farmers' farms, and 

 not on farms devoted to the making of forced records. A Ver- 

 mont Cow-Testing Association member keeping Milking Short- 

 horns found in checking up his records recently that four of his 

 cows had made a net profit over all feed costs of $282. This re- 

 turn was for the butterfat only, which had sold for an average of 

 slightly under 48c per pound. The skim milk was retained and 

 fed to the calves on the farm, many of which have sold for good 

 prices. 



If milk production is the standard by which cows should be 

 judged, the Shorthorn leads them all. In England, on war-time 

 rations, there have been made records as follows : In 1915-16 

 over two hundred cows entered the Register of Merit of the Brit- 

 ish Milking Shorthorn Society with records better than 8,000 Ibs.; 

 thirty-two made over 10,000 Ibs. and there was a top of nearly 

 14,000 Ibs. In 1916-17 five cows made over 13,000 Ibs., two over 

 12,000 Ibs., ten over 11,000 Ibs., thirty-three over 8,000 Ibs., sixty- 



15 



