166 Types and Market Classes of Live Stock 



The head of the dairy cow should be lean, and have a broad muzzle, 

 large nostrils, and a dished face. Compared with the head of the beef 

 animal, there is less width and more length, the proportions of the head 

 being medium long and medium broad. The eyes should be prominent, 

 bright, calm, and wide apart, and the forehead should be fairly wide. 

 The jaws should be strong, and the cheeks well muscled. The ears 

 should be fine in texture, and of medium size. The horns should be 

 fine and have a curve that adds to, rather than detracts from, the 

 appearance. In Guernsey cattle, a yellowish secretion of the skin 

 inside of the ear, and a waxy color of the horn are regarded as evidence 

 that the butter will have a rich, golden color. The head should have 

 a distinctly feminine expression, and in all its features should be clean- 

 cut and sharply defined. Such a head has a chiseled appearance 

 indicative of quality and good breeding. 



The neck should be long and fine. The upper edge has a slight 

 concave curve, and the lower border has a thin fold or edge of skin, 

 called the "dewlap," extending upwards from the brisket. If the neck 

 is short and thick, or has much depth, so as to make it appear heavy, 

 there is a lack of true dairy type. The throat should be neat and trim, 

 rather than full. Naturally we do not want the neck and shoulders 

 to blend smoothly as in beef cattle, for this results from heavy fleshing. 



The brisket of the dairy cow is much narrower and sharper than 

 in beef cattle, and does not carry forward so prominently, the difference 

 being mainly due to the heavy fleshing of the beef animal. 



The shoulders should be light, that is, free from coarseness and 

 heavy fleshing, and the tops of the shoulder blades and the spines of 

 the vertebrae should form rather sharp and refined withers. The 

 shoulders will not appear smooth, but they should not be rough and 

 coarse. A rather open, loosely connected shoulder is associated with 

 the open-jointed conformation desired in the dairy animal, and is a 

 feature found in many of the record-holding cows. 



The front legs should be of medium length, should come down 

 straight, and the toes should point straight ahead. The pasterns 

 should be strong. There should be no coarseness of shanks or joints. 

 Very often the knees come quite close together, the legs being crooked, 

 and the toes turning out, but this is a faulty conforniation and is often 

 associated with a narrow chest and lack of constitution. 



The chest gets its capacity from depth more than from width. 

 However, the fore-rib should have at least a medium degree of arch; 

 breeders of Holstein-Friesian cattle place much emphasis upon a pro- 

 nounced arch of rib. The fore-rib should carry down deep to give 

 plenty of room for the heart and lungs. Beef cattle should fill up full 

 and smooth with flesh behind the shoulder, but dairy cattle typically 



