16 DUAL PURPOSE CATTLE 



THE EXPERIMENT 



John Reeve had not ended his irrigation preparations when Young 

 visited his farm. Reeve had told him that he "had kept a herd of 

 dairy cows," which he had found to be wasteful stock. The 35 acres 

 of prime pasture, the outcome of irrigation, might put dairying in a 

 brighter place in farm economy. But then came in the fact that while 

 there was a rapidly increasing demand for Norfolk "homebreds" for 

 the London market, the practice of spaying "homebred" heifers, which 

 had been pursued for many years, endangered it. Was it possible 

 to breed a cow which would be prime both as a producer of milk and 

 butter, and as dam of stock that from the butcher's point of view 

 would be equal to the nearly extinct "homebred?" Marshall had put 

 on record that the mating of the "Norfolk native, hardy, thriving 

 cows" with the Suffolk polled bull gave "an increase of size and an 

 improvement of form," but a diminution of hardihood and of the apti- 

 tude to fatten quickly at an early age. Further, he held that what 

 we term environment the "soil, climature, and system of manage- 

 ment" should be a primary consideration. We may be sure that 

 Reeve pondered the problem. 



It was then the custom of the Norfolk farmer to ride on his cob 

 to Norwich for the Saturday market. There he might take counsel 

 with men w^ho had full knowledge of the "homebreds." Such men 

 were not rare. We have in the record of the Holkham Sheep Shearing 

 dinners, that Mr. Coke, in 1812, read the award of two farmers who 

 acted as judges in a contest at Hopton, near Yarmouth. James Thur- 

 tell had accepted a challenge, a wager of 20 pounds, that a pair of 

 his bullocks of "the native Norfolk breed" would "plough 12 acres in 

 12 successive journeys of 5 hours each." The trial began on Monday, 

 June 8th, and ended on Saturday, 13th. The judges reported that 

 14 acres, 2 roods, 22 poles 3^ furrows to each yard, except 6 furrows, 

 7 inches deep were "ploughed clean, and in a husbandry manner." 

 This James Thurtell had bred, and, in 1810, had slaughtered a "home- 

 bred" of 103 st. 6% Ibs.: the hide and head weighed 7 st. 8 Ibs. A 

 month earlier another "homebred, bred at Ormesby, gave as carcase 

 weight 150 st. 5 Ibs. (14 Ibs. to the stone): quarters 116 st., loose 

 fat 19 st. 13 Ibs., hide 10 st. 3 Ibs., head 12 st. 10 Ibs., tongue 12 Ibs.: 

 the best bullock ever bred and grazed in Norfolk, and not five years 

 old" (Norwich Mercury," June 19th, 1810). Thurtell at the dinner 

 spoke to Mr. Coke and his guests of the worth of the "Norfolk breed," 

 of which "he had many years full knowledge." Doubtless there were 

 others with whom John Reeve talked ere he resolved to buy a num- 

 ber of polled homebreds, of which as we have mentioned there was in 

 the autumn of 1804 an ample choice within a few miles of Wighton. 

 When the new lease was resolved on he would appear to have secured 

 the service of a blood-red Norfolk "homebred" bull with which to 

 mate his dairy cows. These we may guess were the facts; no record 

 exists that was known to Richard England, his grandson. (This Mr. 

 England was the third of the name to own and cultivate the wealthy, 

 well-watered Binham "Abbey Farm," an area that from the close of 

 the llth century was owned by a few Benedictine monks. The west 

 front of their beautiful priory yet stands. To him I owe my earliest 

 knowledge of the beauties and points of the Red Polled of today, and 

 the speedily formed resolve to establish a Herd Book). 



HYBRIDISATION 



The first well-grounded result of John Reeve's experiment in 

 hybridisation that has come down is th&t on July 1st, 1808, he met 



