BUEEAU OF ANIMAL INDUSTRY. 95 



new to the business have gone into dairying. Creameries have been 

 built and cream routes established on a firm basis, and the farmers 

 have received large sums of money from sales of dairy products at a 

 time when the old standard money crop — cotton — was failing to be 

 profitable. 



The new conditions call for changes in extension methods. It is 

 becoming necessary in many localities to shift the work from the 

 individual to the community basis, and where formerly elementary 

 principles were dealt with, now definite information concerning spe- 

 cific problems must be supplied. 



To make the greatest use of existing market centers, and to allay 

 the demand for creameries where the time was not ripe for them to 

 succeed, as well as to give farmers specific help in getting into dairy- 

 ing, much time has been spent in the organization of 40 routes for 

 collecting cream. It is the policy to ship cream to the nearest market 

 until sufficient support for a creamery can be developed in the 

 section traversed by the route. The new creameries at Mooresville, 

 N. C, and Selma, Ala., are the result of this policy. The field 

 men use these as centers for instruction through the rural schools, 

 and by means of meetings and short courses in dairying. The quan- 

 tity of butter fat already available for collection, as shown by the 

 creameries and cream routes now in operation, is surprisingly large, 

 and shows the need for better markets for the milk and cream that 

 farmers are now ready to produce. 



Creameries have been established at agricultural colleges with 

 which field men are working in South Carolina, North Carolina, 

 Tennessee, and Alabama, and the organization of a plant in con- 

 nection with the Louisiana State University is assured. These col- 

 lege creameries have created enthusiasm among the students, the 

 people of the respective States, and the college authorities them- 

 selves. With the help of the cream routes the South Carolina col- 

 lege creamery has developed in 10 months from 1 patron with 4 

 cows to 209 patrons with 758 cows, and of these patrons 85 or more 

 are new to dairying. There are 10 cream routes, and the cash paid 

 patrons during the month of June was $3,780, nearly $20 apiecs. 

 The college creamery in Alabama, started under great difficulties, has 

 resulted in a private creamery at another point, Selma, and in a 

 cream-shipping business which has attracted to dairying many peo- 

 ple not engaged in it before. 



Where the Texas-fever ticks have been eradicated there is an 

 opportunity for the introduction of improved methods of keeping 

 live stock. In a number of cases men have been appointed for the 

 special purpose of working in a limited portion of the State, where 

 the ticks have been eliminated. 



COW-TESTING ASSOCIATIONS. 



The cow-testing associations are on a firmer footing than they 

 have been in previous years. Early in the fall five new men were 

 appointed to do field work with these associations, but with the 

 outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease all these men were detailed to 

 quarantine work. This disease has been disastrous to the cow-test- 

 ing-association work; many herds belonging to members of associa- 



