Wilson — The Origin of the Dexter- Kerry Breed of Cattle. 13 



tlie Royal Dublin Society, iu 1890, aud the separation of the Dexters and 

 tlie Keiries into two breeds. The effect was, that Dexters could no longer 

 be bred as they liad been almost universally bred in £erry — namely, by 

 crossing the Dexter with the Kerry — and, at the same time, remain eligible 

 for entry in the Herd Bool;. Dexters must now be bred with Dexters only 

 — a procedure well known in Kerry to be disastrous, since a considerable 

 number of the calves produced iu this way were sure to be so misshapen 

 that they were either dead-born or had to be destroyed. 



What was formerly known to Kerry men now became known to otlier 

 breeders who bred Dexters according to the rules of tlie Herd Boole : with tlie 

 result that a breed which is not only beautiful and picturesque but exceed- 

 ingly useful is in a languishing condition. 



This unfortunate state of affairs may be remedied by returning to the 

 ante Herd Book position. The Kerry and the Dexter are one breed, just as 

 much as the red Shorthorn and the roan are one breed. The roan Shorthorn 

 is a hybrid between a red race and a white race ; but the hybrid roan and 

 its two parent races are recognized as one breed. The Dexter is a hybrid 

 between a black race and a red, and the hybrid and its black parent race 

 should be recognized as one breed, or, at any rate, as two divisions of the same 

 breed. By doing so, Dexters could be bred with no more than ordinary cattle- 

 breeding risks, and the present handicap against the breed would be removed. 



Tlie problem might be better understood if it were put concretely and 

 in a Mendelian setting. When red cattle are bred with white, their young 

 are roans. When these roans are bred together, only fifty per cent of their 

 progeny are roans, one-half the remainder being like their white grand- 

 parents and the other half like the red. 



Mendel formulated a theory to explain sucli phenomena. He conceived 

 the idea that plants and animals must carry from their very beginning a 

 lot of intangible somethings which determine their future characters : one 

 for colour, one for size, another for the shape of one part, another for the 

 shape of another, and so on. He furtlier conceived the idea that these 

 determinants must be in two halves, and that one-half must come from 

 each parent. 



Let us see first how this tlieory works in the case of the red, white, and 

 roan cattle. The red cattle carry red determinants, the white white. Let 

 us represent the colour determinant of a red animal by two black circles J , 

 and the colour determinant of a white animal by two white ones, °. When 

 a white and a red animal are mated, one-lialf of a colour determinant from 

 each parent goes to form half of the colour determinant of the progeny, which 

 is therefore a combination of red and white, tluis •. 



