126 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



Berkshire County, who are most successful in their dairies, keep 

 their stock the best. I used to think, a good many years ago, 

 that if stock were kept a little short in winter they would grow 

 enough more in summer to make it up ; but if an animal grows 

 one or two pounds a day in winter, it is more likely to grow 

 three or four in summer than if it had not grown at all in the 

 winter. The quality of the milk is an object in making butter 

 and cheese, and a dairy cow that is well kept will raise more 

 cream than a cow in a low condition, and make more cheese. 



The agricultural qualities of Berkshire County have been 

 called in question here a little. Representing a part of that 

 county, I must stand up in its defence. I believe we have as 

 good land in some parts of that county as there is in the State 

 of Massachusetts, or in any other State in the Union. To 

 illustrate that, I will say that I have in mind a man who last 

 year raised sixteen acres of corn, without any manure, with the 

 exception of a little plaster and ashes put in the hill, and sold 

 eight hundred bushels, and kept what he wanted to use, and 

 lie has a large family, and keeps a large stock of cattle. That 

 corn was raised at an expense of only about fifteen cents a 

 busliel for labor. I have in mind another man who has raised 

 eight acres last year, and got between ninety and a hundred 

 bushels to the acre. I have in mind another man there who 

 lias raised his sixty acres in one body. What the result will be 

 I cannot tell you, but it will be something, with corn at $2 a 

 bushel. And tliat was raised without manure. 



Mr. Stedman, of Chicopee. — I think we shall all agree that 

 the question how to obtain the best dairy cow is of the first 

 importance to Massachusetts farmers. I would suggest, as my 

 opinion, that the best way this can be done is by selecting 

 the best common, or native cows, and crossing them with a 

 thoroughbred bull, and so continuing, using none but thor- 

 oughbred bulls, of some one of the breeds. And in the 

 selection of a bull, we should not only be sure that he is a 

 thoroughbred, but that he is descended from a milking family, 

 as it is well known to those who are conversant with these 

 matters, that there is a vast difference in eacli of the breeds in 

 different families ; some of the families of the Shorthorns, for 

 instance, having cows that produce scarcely milk enough to 



