Vol. LXV. No. 2966. 
NEW YORK, DECEMBER 1, 1906. 
WEEKLY. $1.00 PEIt YEAR. 
THE DAIRY SHORT-HORN. 
In the early development of cattle in Great Britain, 
it is probable that not much attention was paid to 
developing the milking habit of cows. The Long-horn, 
which certainly preceded the Short-horn in popular 
favor, was essentially a beef producer. Later in the 
eighteenth century, the Short-horn grew rapidly in 
favor, and the Long-horn lost its prestige. Among the 
promoters of the Short-horn was Thomas Bates, one 
of the really great breeders in history. Not only did 
Bates recognize the value of the breed for beef, but 
he insisted that the cows should be good milkers. He 
preserved milk records for years, and his Short-horns 
became famous for their dairy value. Thus Bates, in 
the first half of the nineteenth century, stood as a 
great apostle of the merits of the dairy Short-horn. 
The work he did in this field had a wide-reaching 
effect. The Bates fami¬ 
lies for a time were ex¬ 
tremely popular in Eng¬ 
land and America, and 
thus the Short-horn with 
a large udder found her 
way over an immense ter¬ 
ritory. Bulls of Bates’s 
breeding, used on the com¬ 
mon cattle, greatly im¬ 
proved the stock, and did 
more to establish the dual- 
purpose type of cattle 
now common in America 
than anything else. Ordi¬ 
narily, when American 
farmers speak of general- 
purpose cattle, they mean 
grade milking or dairy 
Short-horns. 
If one wishes to see the 
dairy Short-horn cow in 
her finest form, he should 
take a trip through the 
midland and southern 
counties of England. There 
in the fields one may see 
fine herds of cows with 
such udders as are only 
rarely seen in our own 
country. From the rail¬ 
way train, on all sides, the 
dairy Short-horn is a 
prominent feature -on the 
pastures of much of Eng¬ 
land. A large percentage 
of the milk shipped to 
London each day, is pro¬ 
duced in these herds. I 
had the pleasure of visit¬ 
ing in Berkshire, one English farmer who maintained 
500 head of dairy Short-horns, the milk of which was 
shipped to London. 
The true dual-purpose type of cattle lacks the heavy 
fleshing qualities of the more intensified beef sort. In 
comparison with the latter, the former has a some¬ 
what longer, leaner neck, less width on top, especially 
in front, thinner thighs, much more udder in case of 
cows, and is generally muscular and thin-fleshed, rather 
than smooth and thick of covering. However, the 
dual-purpose type, when not milking heavily, responds 
to feed and fleshes up to produce a very acceptable 
carcass to the butcher. Many American farmers value 
this type, for the calves make the best of veal, the 
cows furnish plenty of milk to nurse the calf and supply 
the table, and then if desired, may be easily fattened. 
In some regions, where dairying is not a specially, 
cows with a large per cent of Short-horn blood, yet 
which produce freely of milk, are extremely popular. 
This applies in particular to the States of Ohio, Indi¬ 
ana, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas and Nebraska, in sections 
where the city milk trade and the creamery have not 
promoted the dairy type. 
An immense amount of information is easily avail¬ 
able to show the value of the dairy Short-horn, and 
as an evidence of her worth to the American farmer. 
The average cow of this class will easily produce 4,000 
pounds of milk a year, from which may be secured 
about 200 pounds of butter. These figures, it is to be 
understood, refer to the average of the great multitude. 
Many cows, however, are found in every community 
that will easily yield 5,000 or more pounds of milk. 
Attention in America was first attracted to the milk¬ 
ing Short-horn in a large way, by the tests of cows 
of this breed at the Columbian Exposition at Chicago 
in 1893. In a 90-days’ butter test 23 Short-horn cows 
produced 66,263.2 pounds of milk, which yielded 2,890.86 
pounds of butter. This compared with 73,478.8 pounds 
milk and 4,573.95 pounds of butter from 25 Jerseys. 
In this, test the Short-horn cow Nora made 3,679.8 
pounds of milk, yielding 160.57 pounds butter. In 
general the Short-horn gained in weight and made a 
fairly good net profit. In 1904 another demonstration 
of the value of the Short-horn in the dairy was con¬ 
ducted in the breed test at the Louisiana Purchase 
Exposition. In a trial of 120 days, 20 Short-horn cows 
made an average of 4,421.6 pounds of milk, 165.3 pounds 
butter fat and an average gain of 105 pounds live 
weight in 114 days. This is really a very good showing 
for a four-months’ test. It is not necessary to com¬ 
pare this with that of some other breed, for it illustrates 
the purpose of showing Short-horn dairy power. 
Some of the experiment stations and agricultural 
colleges have owned very productive cows of Short¬ 
horn breeding, though not always purebreds. Perhaps 
one of the best examples is of the cow Rose, owned 
by the Wisconsin Experiment Station. In 326 days 
she produced 10,163 pounds of milk, containing 433.82 
pounds butter fat, equivalent to 506.12 pounds of but¬ 
ter. Deducting the cost of feed, there was a net profit 
on Rose of $79.86 for the year. This is distinctly a 
high-class cow. The cow College Moore, a purebred 
owned by the Kansas Agricultural College, in 13 
months produced milk to yield 474 pounds of butter, 
while her record for four milking periods was 1,695 8 
pounds- of butter. One grade Short-horn cow at the 
New Jersey Station during five years averaged 7,718.3 
pounds milk and 327.48 pounds of butter fat. In 1904 
at the Ohio State University a grade Short-horn cow. 
No. 212 , produced in less than a year 6,720 pounds of 
milk, testing 308 pounds of butter fat. 
Some interesting records may be cited of the work 
of the dairy Short-horn cow on the farms of the coun¬ 
try. Six herds of grade Short-horns in Jefferson Co., 
Wisconsin, numbering 113 
cows, supplying milk to 
creameries, produced an 
average yield of 5,436 
pounds of milk and 240.S 
pounds of butter, showing 
returns of $1.48 from the 
creamery for every $1 
worth of feed fed. One 
of the best known pro¬ 
ducers of dairy Short¬ 
horns in America is Mr. 
J. K. Innis, who owned 
Nora, referred to in the 
Columbian test. Early 
this year (1906) his man¬ 
ager, Mr. May, published 
a most interesting report 
of the cow Mamie Clay 
2d, a purebred dairy 
Short-horn. Beginning as 
a two-year-old in three 
consecutive milking pe¬ 
riods she produced 36,- 
678.3 pounds of milk, with 
an average test of 3.8 per 
cent fat, equivalent to 1,- 
393.78 pounds butter fat, 
or 1,616.07 pounds of buc- 
ter. This is an average of 
538.69 pounds butter for 
each milking period. Sure¬ 
ly this is a fine example of 
a high-class dairy Short¬ 
horn. 
The dual-purpose type 
of cow does not milk so 
persistently as the more 
distinctly dairy one, and 
at seven to eight months 
in lactation she naturally and rapidly falls off in milk 
flow and lays on flesh. However, without question 
there is a place for the dairy Short-horn on the Ameri¬ 
can farm, and in no small degree. Already Short-horn 
breeders are recognizing the necessity of greater milk 
secreting power, and Bates cattle are again coming 
into favor, to be used in herds where the blood lines 
have diverged into beef quality at the serious loss of 
milk secretion and the inability of the dam to furnish 
sufficient nurse for the calf. c. s. plumb. 
RESULTS FROM “CROWDED HENS." 
The recent article on the “Burr” two-story 2,000- 
hen one-man plant impels me in view of Mr. Mapes’ pro¬ 
jected “hen barn” and Mr. Cosgrove’s interesting figures 
and facts, to give you the results of the pullets in one 
side of the house shown. The pullets were Single¬ 
comb White Leghorns and no litter used. These hens 
were fed in troughs, not hoppers; there is no hopper 
THE DAIRY SHORT-HORN COW LAURA. Fig. 399. 
