Change in milk production (lb) 
170 • Impacts of Applied Genetics— Micro-Organisms, Plants, and Animals 
Figure 31.— Milk Yield/Cow and Cow Population, 
United States, 1875-1975 
Year 
SOURCE: J. T, Reid, "Progress in Dairy Cattle Production,” Agricultural and 
Food Chemistry: Past. Present, and Future. R, Teranishi (ed,) 
(Westport, Conn.: Avi Press, 1978). 
Other species of poultry as well, production 
processes have become equally efficient. 
As A. W. Nordskog has noted: 
Compared with the breeding of other eco- 
nomically important animals, poultry breed- 
ing has been the first to leave the farm ... to 
become part of a sophisticated breeding in- 
dustry. On a commercial level, chickens ha\ e 
been the first to be commercially exploited 
by the application of inbreeding-hybridiza- 
tion techniques, as earlier used in corn, as 
well as by methods of selective improvement 
using the principles of quantitative genetics. 
Thus, the poultry industry, compared to 
other animal industries, seems to have been 
the quickest to apply modern methods of 
genetic improvement, including the employ- 
ment of formally trained geneticists to handle 
breeding technology plus the use of com- 
puters and other modern business methods.® 
Figure 32.— Milk Production per Cow (Holsteins) in j • 
1958-78 (New York and New England) Scientific production 
2-year old Holstein cows in DHIA by A. I. Sires 
-1-4000 
-1-3000 
- 1-2000 
- 1- 1000 
Base 
1958 1962 1966 1970 1974 1978 
Year 
SOURCE: R. H. Eoote, Department of Animal Science, Cornell University, 
Ithaca, N.Y. from unpublished data of R. W. Everett, Cornell 
University. 
those for farm species. For turkeys, the use 
of A1 in hreeding for hreast meat has been 
so successful that commercial turkeys can 
no longer breed naturally. The big- 
breasted male, even when inclined to do so, 
finds it physically impossible to mount the 
female. As a result, a full 100 percent ot the 
commercial turkey flock in the United 
States is replaced each year using Al. In 
Farm resources incliuk' land, labor, capital, 
and, increasingly, n(>\\ know l(Hlge. I'oday, those 
who innovate recapturi' tlu' costs of innovating 
by maintaining output vvhiU' lowering costs or 
by inci’easing output vv bile bolding costs (low n. 
Some results of the drive tow ard elTiciencv have 
included increasing spec'ialization, intensified 
use of capital and land relative to labor, and in- 
tegration of production phases. 
Foultry and liv (‘stock operations have slow Iv 
b('come sp(‘cializ('d ov (‘r the past .">() years. I be 
farmer who used to do bis ow n br(‘eding, rais- 
ing, feeding, and slaughtering is disa|)pearing. 
Now, the b(‘(*f cattle industry in tlu* United 
States consists of: the pur(*bred breeder who 
provides br(‘eding stock, the commercial pro- 
ducei’, tb(‘ fe('d(’r, tlu' packer, and the retailer 
Similar sp(*cialization has occurred lor most 
other species— e.g., less than l.b primary hi-e(‘d- 
ers maintain the breeding stock that produces 
the 3.7 billion chickens consumed ea('b year in 
the United States. Fbe emergenc(* of other s[)e- 
cialized services— such as AI prov iders, manage- 
“A. vv. Nordskog, "Success ;iiul l ailurc fit (^u.inin.iliv c (.cnclic 
Theory in I’oultry" in /’rocccd/Vig.s of I hr Inlrnuilinnnl ( ontrrrnir 
on Quantitative Genetics, Kdward I’ollacki’l el al led I I Vmei • 
Iowa: Iowa Slale Universily 1‘iess, l!)77l, |i|i J7-.'il 
