THE UNITED KINGDOM. 221 



West Highland. Outside through summer and winter. Supplied with 

 hay and some turnips during severe snow storm or frost. 



Ayrshire. Grazing in summer. Kept mostly in byres during winter, 

 with runs out in open weather. 



FEEDING SCOTCH CATTLE. 



There is very little cake or purchased food fed to any of the breeds, 

 excepting for animals intended for exhibition, or during the last few 

 months of preparation for the butcher. 



Bather more extra feeding is supplied to the Aberdeen Angus than to 

 the other breeds, especially in the case of high-bred pedigree stocks. 



BREEDING SCOTCH CATTLE. 



In the select pedigree herd bulls are kept in the house, and the females 

 are brought to them at the discretion of the owners, having scrupulous 

 regard to the relationship and corresponding features of the animals. 



In general commercial stocks, or breeding for the butcher, it is quite 

 common in the case of Galloway, Highland, or Ayrshire cattle, to al- 

 low a bull to graze regularly in a park with twenty to thirty females. 



HANDLING PRODUCTS. 



As regards dairy produce, that obtained from the Galloways aud Ayr- 

 shires is largely made into cheese, the remainder being chiefly disposed 

 of in sweet milk to the large towns by rail and milk-carts. 



The Polled Angus and Highland inmost cases foster their own calves 

 and supply milk for the necessities of the various holdings. 



A great many of the Ayrshire cows' calves are sent at once to the 

 butcher, while others are fattened at the age of a month or two as veal, 

 but the calves of the other three breeds are, as a rule, brought to ma- 

 turity at the various ages indicated in the foregoing table. 



TOPOGRAPHY OF SCOTLAND. 



With reference to the questions of altitude and temperature indicated 

 on the schedule accompanying the cattle circular^ I may briefly state 

 that Scotland has been aptly defined as "a great plateau, deeply cut 

 into valleys and having mountains rising to 2,000 or 3,000, and occa- 

 sionally even 4,000, feet of elevation." The climate is exceedingly va- 

 riable. From its insular position, however, the cold in winter is not so 

 intense nor the heat in summer so great as in corresponding latitudes 

 in the United States or on the continent of Europe. 



The temperature, except in moorlands in the interior and the more 

 mountainous districts, seldom remains long at the freezing point, nor 

 in any part of the country does it often rise to an intensity incommod- 

 ing the labor of the field. The ordinary greatest range of the ther- 

 mometer is between 84 and 8. 



While the average temperature generally may be held to range be- 

 tween 45 and 47, it is noteworthy that it does not descend as the ob- 

 server moves northward, or to the vicinity or into the interior of the 

 Highlands. 



The mean temperature of Scotland, noted at fifty-five stations, alti- 

 tude 25G feet, during the year 1883, was 45 9', and the mean tempera- 

 ture of the city of Edinburgh with an altitude of 260 feet, for the same 

 period, was 46 9'. 



