Page:The Evolution of British Cattle.djvu/145

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BLENDING AND SORTING
133

Old Jock's pedigree[1]

Old Jock, born in 1842, we shall see the Bakewellian method as carried out in its most intense form. Then, by another diagram, we shall see the streams through which the blood of Old Jock flowed down to some of his most illustrious descendants, first at Mains of Kelly and Kinnaird, in Forfarshire, then at Tillyfour, in Aberdeenshire, and finally at Ballindalloch, in Banffshire, the places to which in succession Aberdeen-Angus breeders have turned for stock bulls and higher class cows and heifers. A short examination of these diagram pedigrees will show that the inbreeding begun by Hugh Watson was continued, though with less intensity, by his successors. The extraordinary concentration of Old Jock blood in Aberdeen-Angus cattle to-day may be gathered from the fact that it would be difficult, if not impossible, to find

  1. In the "Aberdeen-Angus Herd Book," as to Old Jock's pedigree; but, after considerable inquiry and examination, the above seems to be its last few generations.