DAIRY MEETING. 1 77 



also weighs the roughage and the grain, both night and morning. 

 The milk is tested, the butter fat computed, and records are 

 made of the milk yield, the butter fat produced and the feed 

 consumed by each cow. After this is done, a copy of the record 

 of this work is left with the individual farmer, and that member 

 carries him to the home of the next member, and thus a com- 

 plete circuit of the association is made once each month. We 

 have placed here before you a copy of the blanks which we use, 

 the one on the left being the herd or daily blank, from which 

 the information is copied to the yearly or individual record. 



This method places the work in the hands of a disinterested 

 person, a man who is especially qualified to do the work, a man 

 whose duty it is to do it upon certain days. This has to do 

 with the practical work of the association. The economical 

 feature of the work we try to cover by providing in each asso- 

 ciation enough herds to keep a man employed 26 working days 

 in each month, and that those herds shall contain enough cows 

 to bring the cost to at least within $1.25 per cow for the year's 

 work. The cost does not exceed that in any of the associations. 

 It is around $1.00. 



The educational part of the work is taken up in this way: 

 First, by leaving a copy of the records with the farmer and by 

 the discussion of every feature of that report and every feature 

 of each cow's work with the dairymen, by the opportunity he 

 has for comparison through the examination of the records of 

 other herds, and by the information gained at the monthly meet- 

 ings of the association. Our associations all have meetings 

 once each month, and at these meetings the Department of Agri- 

 culture has a representative to discuss with them the problems 

 that confront them in their dairy work. So these are the fea- 

 tures that contribute to the educational part of the work, — first, 

 the definite information given to the man concerning his own 

 herd ; second, the information that comes to him concerning 

 the work of all the other herds of the association (and you 

 know that a large measure of the progress of the average per- 

 son comes through comparison), and third, the gathering 

 together once each month for these meetings, to advise with one 

 another. The meetings are conducted with the idea of develop- 

 ing the individuality of the member and also of imparting 

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