STARTING A DAIRY HERD 111 



such as purpose in view, knowledge of the business, resources 

 at hand, etc. As a rule, the production of dairy products and 

 not of breeding stock should be made the foundation of the 

 business. There is no objection or reason why the two should 

 not be combined, but only in exceptional cases can a man ex- 

 pect to run a herd as a profitable business on the proceeds of 

 sales of breeding stock alone. 



If the object is the sale of dairy products alone, high-grade 

 animals serve the purpose equally as well as the registered. 

 Every grade herd, however, should have a registered bull of 

 good individual merit and backed by good dairy records. The 

 use of a good bull and careful selection of individual cows by 

 keeping records will make it possible to build up a high-pro- 

 ducing herd within a few years. 



There are in general two ways of getting a good herd of 

 dairy cows together. The first is by purchase, the second by 

 breeding them. The first is the quicker, but can be followed 

 only by those having ample capital. As a rule, good dairy 

 cows cannot be had except at high prices. It is always the 

 poor milkers that are for sale, and not the good ones. To get 

 a herd of good milkers together by purchase is possible, but ex- 

 pensive. As a rule, where cows are all purchased and none 

 bred, the average production is low and it never gets much 

 better as long as this course is pursued. In addition to the 

 certain result of finding that many of the purchased cows are 

 unprofitable, there is great and constant danger of bringing 

 disease into the herd with purchased cows. Tuberculosis 

 and contagious abortion are often brought into a herd in this 

 manner. 



For the majority the best plan is to breed most of the cows 

 to be used in the herd. If the herd must be started with the 



