150 agriculture; of maine. 



there is a case where the teat gets into that condition, it is impos- 

 sible to milk that cow, and yet you discover nothing wrong with 

 the udder. There is where the milk tube comes m. This is one 

 of the most valuable instruments for a dairyman, and every 

 dairyman should have it. He should know what a proper size 

 milk tube is, and he should know how to use it. Here is where 

 the difficulty comes. A man will say, I tried to use a milk tube 

 and I spoiled the teat. A man here has some milk tubes for sale, 

 and if I should simply say to you that you should buy a milk 

 tube, and you went to buy one, I guarantee that you would pick 

 out the longest and the largest, because they are all of one price 

 and you are all Yankees and want to get the most you can for 

 the money. I am not going to discredit the sale of those milk 

 tubes, but half of those on exhibition here are not adapted to use 

 with the cows you have here. If a man bought one of the long- 

 est and largest ones here and took it home, what would be the 

 efTect ? It seems as though men think that the further they insert 

 the milk tube into the udder, the more milk they are going to get. 

 That is not true. All the milk there is in a cow's udder is right 

 beneath the real body of the udder, and the tube should never 

 be inserted farther than simply up into the milk cistern, not up 

 too near the udder, because you are using a hard substance in a 

 very sensitive gland. A tube 2^/4 inches long is really too long. 

 There is not a cow on your farm or in your herd but that a 2^/2 

 inch tube will reach the milk cistern. So much for the tube. 

 Now how are we going to use it? I do not know how many 

 germs there are on mv hands, nor anybody else. I washed them 

 this morning, but I do not know anything about it. If I were to 

 simply come down from this platform and insert that tube into 

 the teat of a cow, the chances are that some germs would be car- 

 ried up and they might be germs which would irritate or inflame. 

 Here is where the carbolized oil becomes a handy thing to have 

 in a stable. If I had that mixed right here I would dip the milk 

 tube into it, and in about one moment it would be safe and really 

 disinfected. If I did not have that, boiling water is one of the 

 finest disinfectants. I would simply dip my milk tube into that. 

 No milk tube should be placed up the udder until it has been dis- 

 infected, and the man must not touch it with his hands after that 

 has been done. That is along the line of what I was telling you 

 in relation to the milk fever device. A man will say. Yes, I cured 



