Brazil today and tomorrowJoyce, L. E. Elliott (Lilian Elwyn Elliott)
History
Brazil today and tomorrow
Joyce, L. E. Elliott (Lilian Elwyn Elliott)
Brazil; Brazil -- Economic conditions
One of the best breeding stations in Brazil is situated at the good,
modern, actively-managed School of Agriculture at Piracicaba, in S.
Paulo State, reached by the Sorocabana line; good imported bulls are
stationed here, as well as some fine specimens of types developed in
Brazil, notably the Caracú, a well-formed animal with a pale buff hide
that is well fitted to form the base of standardized herds. The Caracú
already has its official herd-book. Some attempts made to introduce pure
blood foreign animals have ended in the death of the importations,
perhaps chiefly because their accustomed food was lacking; for this
reason the opinion of many stock-raisers in Brazil is against efforts to
create pure herds of, say, Herefords, as Argentina has done, preferring
the selection of a sound national type, acclimated, hardy, which can be
improved by careful breeding. Controversy rages about this question in
Brazil, and without trying to enter into it I will quote the opinion of
Dr. Cincinato Braga, one of Brazil’s authorities on the subject of
cattle, who says that at least six thousand pure-race bulls should be
imported annually to improve the existing stock, while as a matter of
fact only a few hundred enter yearly, and these chiefly as a result of
private enterprise. The vexed question as to whether the introduction of
Indian cattle, with its resultant inheritance of a hump in the zebu type
(the hump has the disadvantage of not “packing,” say some of the buyers
for frigorificos), is good or bad may be safely left to those ardent
cattle-breeders Drs. Pereira Barretto, Eduardo Cotrim, Assis Brasil,
Fernand Ruffier, and many others; it is undoubted that in the Triangle
of Minas Geraes, with its centre Uberaba, fortunes have been made from
prolific Indian cattle, but public opinion remains perplexed. Writing
from Minas in early 1916, J. Nogueira Itagyba told the tale of his
experiences as a cattle-breeder—how he imported a bull from Holland,
bought Caracú cows, obtained a young herd, and then when droughts came
in 1913–14, lost “thirty or more head, under a deluge of ticks, tumours,
insects of all kinds....” He then bought a Nellore (Indian) bull,
obtained a breed that was “a revelation” and came to this conclusion:
“In Paraná and Rio Grande, where the climate is cold and there are fine
pastures, a stock breeder with capital can raise the Devon, Hereford,
Flemish, Durham, Jersey, etc.; he will have appropriate forage, and can
use dips and calf-foods ... but in wild rural regions only strong,
acclimated races resisting climate and insect plagues can prosper.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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