Types and Market Classes of Live Stock 



175 



is a secondary matter with her. Such cows consume Httle feed and 

 exhibit a fastidious appetite; in short, they are not useful cattle, there 

 being too much waste of energy in nervousness and bad temper. In 

 contrast to such cows is the cow that never moves faster than a walk 

 and is gentle and easy to handle. She spends lots of time chewing her 

 cud and is always busy making milk. She is a useful, profitable cow, 

 provided she has the conformation which enables her to work success- 

 fully. The irritable cow has an uneasy and wild expression of the eye, 

 and carries her head high. She is usually switching her tail whether 

 it is fly-time or not. Proper disposition is indicated by a calm eye, 

 and by carriage of the poll of the head on about the same level as the 



Fig. 61. — An inferior dairy cow. Note the staggy head, coarse neck, uneven 

 top line, small barrel, coarse sloping rump, beefy thighs, and small funnel-shaped 

 udder. Her wedge from the side view points the wrong way. 



withers. If the head is carried high it indicates nervousness, while a 

 head carried low indicates quietness carried to the extreme of sluggish- 

 ness. 



The size of dairy cows varies between wide limits. The holders 

 of the highest records in milk and butter-fat production are large cows, 

 which is a condition naturally to be expected, but does not signify 

 that small cows are necessarily less profitable. The dairyman cares 

 not so much that his cows are large and hence large yielders, as that 

 the yield be made economically; he studies the production in relation 



