26 ILLINOIS STATE DAIRYMEN'S ASSOCIATION. 



to believe in the influence of that power termed heredity. It 

 has been said that no great man ever Hved v^ithout having had a 

 good mother, and it may be said with equal force that no great 

 dairy cow was ever produced without good ancestry. On the 

 other hand, we cannot ignore the influence of favorable sur- 

 roundings, of kindly treatment, etc. I think we may say that, 

 taking the history of the civilized nations, the great nations of 

 the earth are the well fed nations, and we find the same force at 

 work in the development of domestic animals. So important 

 is this influence that I believe it possible to take the best bred 

 dairy calf in existence and entirely ruin it for practical dairy pur- 

 poses by one year of injudicious feeding. On the other hand, 

 we may take an animal of inferior merit and very much improve 

 its qualites by judicious feeding and treatment. 



The dairy breeds that are in most common use in this coun- 

 try to-day, as I said, have originated in the Channel Islands, in 

 Holland, Germany and Switzerland, and some have combined 

 dairy and beef charcteristics. These have originated under 

 conditions that are highly favorable to the development of good 

 cows, and we must bear in mind the fact that these breeds can- 

 not be maintained here without deterioration unless we surround 

 them by equally favorable influences. Then besides that it 

 matters not how carefully we select, how carefully we breed and 

 feed for the best results, there will always be quite a large per- 

 centage in the best bred and best managed herds that will be 

 practically worthless. There is a tendency to reversion and 

 that principle always operates, and I believe it operates to a 

 larger degree with the dairy cow than any other class of our 

 cattle, certainly to a larger degree than with the beef animal. 

 All practical dairymen have met with that experience, and a 

 great many more are keeping cows of that kind in their herds 

 without being fully aware of the fact, I mean unprofitable cows. 



In pleading for the practical cow I wish to emphasize the 

 necessity of studying the breed and also the type, but I believe 

 it is a better thing to simply study the cow for what she is, for 

 her practical utility. It is by facts that we must arrive at our 



