68 AGRICULTURE OF MAINE. 



main reasons which farmers assign for exercise are eliminated. 

 Then the question is, How much must we let the cow out to 

 stretch her muscles ? This is a pretty delicate problem to speak 

 upon, because the general practice and the general belief is that 

 cows must be let out for exercise. I think they are exposed too 

 much. I have no objection to the exercise if it is not obtained 

 at the expense of exposure. The Hollander has never practiced 

 it. He puts his cow into the barn in the fall and she does not 

 go out until the next spring. She is stabled continuously for 

 six months. They have a trench behind the cows two feet wide 

 and two feet deep, in order to keep them clean, and they have 

 to put a bridge over it when they put the cows in, in the fall. 

 Under those conditions it is inconvenient to let their cows out. 

 The weather of Holland is as severe as it is here, and they must 

 have to keep their stables rather closely shut up, and yet I 

 believe there is no breed of cows today which has greater consti- 

 tution and greater vitality, if there is such a thing as vitality in 

 animals, than the Holstein cow, and she has been bred for gen- 

 erations and generations without exercise in winter. I have no 

 objection to a limited amount of exercise, but do not turn cows 

 out for an hour or two of exercise in cold winter weather and 

 hope to instill into them greater constitutions. 



The dairyman must realize, also, the importance of regularity 

 in the feeding and the milking of animals. I do not think we 

 realize how easily disturbed an animal is. It was called to my 

 attention a short time ago in this way : We were using a milking 

 machine and a stranger wearing a fur coat came into the barn. 

 He stepped in beside the two cows to see the milk flow in the 

 little glass tube on top of the machine. He said he could not 

 see it. Sure enough, it had stopped. Those two cows shut 

 right off the moment that man came in. How did they do it? 

 They certainly held up the milk and did not give down again 

 until some time after the stranger had gone out of the barn. 

 When the calf is taken away from the mother the latter will 

 often hold up her milk. In these cases it is not an act of will 

 but an unconscious effect on the nervous system. I met a 

 farmer about a year ago who said he had a beautiful heifer, 

 which had recently calved and was doing finely. He was milk- 

 ing her and was proud of her. But one day she got into the 



