mckeague
Ex 97 2E
Registered: 06-2003
Posts: 1628
Karma: 14 (+14/-0)
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Re: Just How Far the Holstein Breed has come?
Looks like someone out there agrees with us, she was Ai'd yesterday to Roylane Jordan, we felt he could give us that little bit of dairy quality and the extra definition in the ligament, fingers crossed for a heifer!! (p.s. i have to agree with the last comment, Linjet does spell out 'wood' not exactly what we are loking for!!!)
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1/7/2003, 13:39
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mmt95
EX95
Registered: 11-2003
Location: USA
Posts: 605
Karma: 13 (+13/-0)
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Re: Just How Far the Holstein Breed has come?
Remember, we breed for need. What type of a milk cow did we need 50, 60, or 100 years ago? The wife and children did most of the milking, and by hand. So the need was for a gentle cow with an accessible udder and teats long enough to accomodate hand milking. Who cared about the rump? With little, if any testing records, udder size was thought to indicate the amount of milk a cow would give.
Milk was usually seperated, with butter and cream for the family, and skim for the pigs. Unless one could sell milk in town, there was no need for heavy producers.
We all know this, so no wonder the dairy cow has changed. Several hundred years ago cattle were tri-purpose, draft, meat, and milk. With the advent of the horse collar, the shift was to dual-purpose cattle. Now we breed for milk.
If the electricity went off, we couldn't milk very many of our cows by hand. We couldn't even feed them. But now our genereators take care of that problem.
There are no cattle genes present today that weren't available 200 years ago, but due to narrow breeding, many of the genes available then may no longer be accessible. That could become a problem when we again need to breed for natural good health, maternal instincts & calving traits, longevity, temperament, and foraging ability.
Genetic conservancy may well become of prime importance.
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12/1/2004, 4:12
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