656 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Dec. 



their keeping in the wool which I sold from them, 

 the Cotswolijs have every year paid a good per 

 cent, on co«t. The sales from my forty Cotswolrts 

 la.^t year were a little short of four hundred dollars, 

 or a fraction over ten dollars a head, besides keep- 

 ing my ilock good. My l)nck Iambs averaged 

 over a hundred pounds a head. Mr. George N. 

 Sanborn, of Laconia, N. H., writes me that a pair 

 of twin lambs bred from a Cotswold buck from 

 my flock on a fine sheep, weighed 109 and 115 

 pounds. It often happens that a cross of pure 

 blood Cotswold on strong Merino ewes will pro- 

 duce a progeny that will outgrow the parents on 

 either side, and a second cross are always prolific. 



I have twice exhibited sheep at our Connecticut 

 State Fair, with three lambs brought up entirely 

 on the sheep. The tirst three weighed 100, 104, and 

 108 pounds, the next three 100 each. A cross of 

 the Cotswold on the sheep of the Northern States, 

 will make as good market laml)s as can be pro- 

 duced. I once raised a pair of Cotswold lambs, 

 one of which weighed at seven months 144 His. 



From present appearances it will be a long time 

 before the supply of combing wools will be equal 

 to the demand. T. L. Hakt. 



West Cornwall, Conn., Oct. 1, 1868. 



Remarks. — What say the breeders of the Cots- 

 wold and other coarse wooled sheep to the charge 

 of some of the breeders of the Merinos, that the 

 former are of such roving habits, that the common 

 fences of New England are insufficient to keep 

 them in place ? 



HEREFORD CATTLE. 



As I wish to purchase a few "thoroughbred" 

 Hereford cows or heifers, I would like to ascer- 

 tain who are the breeders of this kind of stock in 

 this country or in Canada. Can you tell me of 

 any way to do so ? Is there a Hereford Herd 

 Book ? If so, where can I obtain one ? 



If you can give me the desired information you 

 will greatly oblige a constant reader of your val- 

 uable paper. 



As I have some of the "Underwood stock," I want 

 something different to cross with it. I have a 

 heifer calf seven months old that girts five feet 

 and weighs 020 pounds. H. C. Burleigh. 



Fairjteld, Me., Oct. 20, 1868. 



Remarks. — We publish in another column some 

 extracts from Mr. Allen's American Cattle in re- 

 lation to the Herefords. In reply to our corres- 

 pondent we would say that we know of no thor- 

 oughbred Herefords nearer than the herd of H. 

 Cochrane, Esq., Compton Centre, Canada East, or 

 rather Province of Quebec. Some time since we 

 published some account of the herd of Herefords 

 owned by F. W. Stone, Esq., of Guelph, Canada 

 West, who, after having kept the Durhams and the 

 Herefords on the same farm and under the same 

 conditions, gives the latter the preference. Mr. 

 Sanford Howard who examined Mr. Stone's stock 

 last July, says that "all persons who have had any 

 thing to do with them concur in stating that the 

 Hereford cows give, on an average, as much milk 

 by the season as the Short- horns, while some ex- 

 periments that have been made show that in rich- 

 ness of milk the Herefords are superior." We 

 presume that there has been no American herd 

 bood of the Herefords published in this country. 

 Marks of a Hereford cross are often seen in the 

 cattle from Maine offered for sale at the Brigbtoo 



cattle market, and it may be an inquiry of some 

 interest, how far the acknowledged superiority of 

 working oxen from that State is owing to a strain 

 of the Hereford blood. 



We have also received from "A Subscriber," in 

 Webster, Me., inquiries similar to those of Mr. 

 Burleigh, to whom we must say that we do not 

 know of any breeder of the Herefords in Massa- 

 chusetts. If there are any they will see the ne- 

 cessity of advertising the public of the fact. 



AB0B,TI0N OF COWS. 



About the first of September, one of my cows 

 slunk her calf, and in about ten days after another, 

 and in ten days more a third one. I can not ac- 

 count fir the facts. Can you give any mformation 

 upon the case through the Farmer ? 



Benjamin Adams. 



Amherst, Mass., Oct. 23, 1868. 



Rem.-vrks. — This disease began to manifest itself 

 in the dairy sections of New York about twelve 

 years ago, and has been gradually increasing ever 

 since. In a memorial presented to the Legislature 

 of that State in 1866, by the President and Secre- 

 tary of the State Agricultural Society, it is esti- 

 mated that in that year one-quarter of all the cows 

 in Herkimer County aborted ; in Oneida, 20 per 

 cent; in Otsego, 15; in Lewis, 12 per cent. This 

 was an alarming statement, and the legislature at 

 once appropriated a liberal sum of money for the 

 expense of a thorough investigation of the causes 

 of the disease. The first report of the State Com- 

 missioners was made last winter, and was mostly 

 of a negative character — affirming what did not, 

 rather than what did, cause the disease. The few 

 practical lessons of this report are summed up by 

 the Country Gentleman as follows : — that farmers 

 should raise their own heifers — that the farmer 

 should not sell to anybody else the cow which he 

 thinks too likely to abort to be retained in his 

 own herd — in other words, that determined efforts 

 should be made, in the districts specially concerned, 

 to prevent the dissemination of the difficulty by 

 the purchase and sale of animals not known to 

 have been free from it previously — to secure the 

 feeding of cows so affected for the butcher, or 

 their isolation from all unaffected animals, if the 

 owner choose to retain them, — and, in case new 

 and healthy cows are brought upon a farm, the 

 thorough purification of the stables, and, if possi- 

 ble for a season or two, the use of different pas- 

 tures from those which the diseased animals have 

 lately grazed. 



A correspondent of the same paper, who ac- 

 knowledges himself indeb'ed for his facts to Mr. 

 J. Barlow, of the Veterinary College, Edinburgh, 

 thus speaks of the fact that odors arising from 

 cows that have aborted give rise to abortion in 

 other cows : — "It is a well known fact, that by 

 the sense of smell cows detect when one of their 

 companions has calved. If the birth takes place 

 in the pasture, cows will smell the place of its oc- 

 currence, and loiter about it for days and weeks 

 after. When a cow calves in the stable, other cows 



