80 REPORT OF THE AGRICULTURE OF AYRSHIRE. 



Varying according to season of year and quality of milk, 

 about 190 imperial pints, on an average, turn out an Ayrshire 

 stone, 24 lbs., of new sweet-milk or full-milk cheese. Fifteen 

 pints per day will thus give us 14J stones of new cheese from 

 each cow for the six months, or 18 stones annually from each 

 cow if all the milk was converted into cheese. The season's 

 make of six months in some of the best grazing districts, as in 

 the parishes of Kilmaurs, Stewarton, Dreghorn, Dailly, &c, may 

 average fully 16 stones ; but against these we can easily find 

 other cold-clay districts, as in most parts of the parishes of Kil- 

 winning, Mauchline, Dairy, Sorn, Stair, Coylton, &c, where the 

 average will not exceed 12 stones. Take it another way : sup- 

 pose that all the stocks of 20 milch-cows, over the county, turn 

 out on an average one cheese daily of 36 lbs. weight for the sea- 

 son of six months, that gives us only 13^ stones to each cow. 



The reader will observe that " new cheese," is the term used 

 above. The cheese dry in and lose weight the longer they are 

 kept. The amount of indrink may be from one-twelfth to one- 

 sixteenth part of the whole, — that is, if the whole " kane" is 

 kept on hand by the farmer till about Martinmas. The custom 

 in most cases, however, is to sell the whole season's make some- 

 time during June or July, and deliver the cheeses into the mer- 

 chants' stores as made, in two or three separate lifts, so that a 

 share of the indrink thus falls upon the merchant. Half a stone 

 of indrink may therefore be placed against the make from each 

 cow. Cheese fairs (three annually) were lately established at 

 Kilmarnock under the auspices of the " Ayrshire Agricultural 

 Association," the principal one being held on the last Thursday 

 of October, but these have been poorly supported as yet by the 

 farmers, only some 20 to 25 tons being brought forward on an 

 average at each, and it may be years (if ever) ere they come to be 

 much patronized. Farmers, as a rule, will not readily " happ" 

 or " wyenn" in any direction save that which oleases themselves, 

 and haply in most cases rightly so, as then ought to be the best 

 judges of their own business. Auld use and wont practice holds 

 the reins with very many, and this it is, we believe, not the 

 high prices so much, which continues the ryegrass-seeding 

 custom in these advanced times of farming. 



The average number of cows in milk in Ayrshire in 1856-57 

 was 38,573, but we may reasonably suppose a greater acreage 

 now under grass, from green-cropping and corn crops gradually 

 diminishing of late years, and that more milch cows consequently 

 will be kept — say 40,000. These, at 3,400 pints of milk each, 

 or 17^ stones of cheese (allowing for indrink) each, at 54s. per 

 cwt,, will give the value of the annual produce in milk — viz., 

 £405,000 ; to which add the price of 39,000 newly-dropt calves 

 (allowing for aburtions) at 7s. each, or £13,650, and we have the 



