254 BOAED OF AGEICULTURE. 



and a good vascular system, with a good milk-vein, — all- 

 these put together will make such a cow as every farmer 

 desires for dairy purposes. 



Now, how are you going to produce such an animal ? You 

 can reproduce beef-producing animals without any trouble, 

 just as you can produce pigs, dogs or cats ; not always up to 

 the standard, but you can come pretty near the standard. 

 But if you expect to produce a milk-producing herd with as 

 little care as you can produce a beef-producing herd, you are 

 entirely mistaken. You may take a calf, for instance, when 

 it is dropped, a calf that is intended for a beef-proclucing 

 animal, and feed it just as you like. You can keep it on the 

 cow, if you wish, six months, and make it weigh as much as 

 a yearling at the end of that time ; and feed liberally from 

 this time onward with entire impunity. You have done 

 nothing to throw it out of the condition you desired, Ijut have 

 cultivated and improved upon it. If, however, you expect to 

 get a good dairy-cow by feeding a calf, in that fashion you 

 will find yourself entirely mistaken. You cannot raise a 

 good cow by letting the calf run upon the cow six months. 

 You stimulate in that way every function, except the func- 

 tions for the production of milk. You stimulate all the fat- 

 producing functions, you enlarge and increase the cellular tis- 

 sue ; you increase the size of the bone ; you throw that 

 animal, which is intended for the work of making milk, out 

 of that line of life. So you must take a calf that is intended 

 for that purpose, and wean it early. Do not increase its 

 size too rapidly ; keep it growing steadily ; do not allow it to 

 take on any great mass of fat ; convert it into a cow-looking 

 calf as quickly as possible. Do not disturb that animal by 

 undertaking to make a prize calf of it, — to take the first 

 prize when it is a yearling, and never make its appearance 

 again. 



These are my opinions with regard to the production of 

 beef-producing and the production of milk-producing ani- 

 mals. One great reason why we fail so often in our produc- 

 tion of milk-producing animals is, that we will not be governed 

 by the two laws that I have laid down ; in the first place, to 

 keep our cows in a calm, quiescent condition ; and, in the 

 next place, to feed a milk-producing animal according to the 



