32 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



increases his feed and increases his milk, but one day he gets 

 more milk than another, and the more milk the cow is forced 

 to give, the greater the variation between the daily milkings. 

 The owner of the inferior cow asks his neighbor what causes 

 him to get so much milk, and the reply is, the feeding of 

 corn meal and shorts, all the cow can eat. So the owner of 

 the inferior cow, who never obtained over 10 quarts at the 

 flush, concludes to force his cow. He feeds corn meal and 

 shorts as directed, but although his milk yield is increased 

 slightly, we will say to 11 or 12 quarts, he can get no more, 

 but his cow gives about the same amount daily. The two 

 friends get together and talk it over. They compare notes and 

 find that the difference in the yield is in the cows, and that 

 the better the cow the greater daily variation when forced to 

 their limit ; they find that corn meal and shorts do not furnish 

 milk, but simply act as food to the cow, and it is for her to 

 manufacture this food into as much milk as she is able ; that 

 the cow of large yield, doing her best, is more subject to be 

 interfered with by extraneous circumstances, than is the other 

 cow ; that reducing the food of the one cow is followed by a 

 diminution of milk, and that diminution of the food given to 

 the other cow affects the milk yield but slightly. Being men 

 of a certain intelligence, they note that feed as they will, the 

 cows will not dry up entirely, but will turn some of their food 

 towards milk production, and that increase of the food supply 

 will affect the one cow in her yield far more than the other. 

 If the cows are receiving less food than they require for the 

 support of an active life, doubling the food supply may double 

 the milk yield, but quadrupling the food supply will not quad- 

 ruple the milk yield, and the only way to obtain the largest 

 amount of milk from a given amount of food is to feed out 

 supplies to cows of a superior character ; to keep a superior 

 animal for the conversion of the food. 



In this case, we never hear of the fiirmer finding fault with 

 the miller, and claiming that the food fed is worthless, etc. 

 Yet, these same farmers will use a seed corn which cannot 

 normally yield over 35 or 40 bushels per acre, apply super- 



