142 AGRICULTURE 01? MAINE. 



a can of cream springs a leak any workman who chances to be 

 near can put his thumb over the hole and pour the contents into 

 another can. But there may be leaks going on of quite as great 

 importance though not so apparent. Take the case of water 

 content in butter. There are reasonable limits to the percentage 

 of water in butter. It is unwise and dishonest to saturate butter 

 with all the water it can be made to carry. On the other hand 

 it is the height of stupidity to work butter excessively dry when 

 consumers do not like it so well. 



Suppose I have in my worker a batch of butter that is properly 

 worked and contains, say, 14 or 15 per cent of water. I 

 now carelessly let the worker run until I have worked out 

 water to the extent of 2 per cent of the weight of the butter. 

 That is easily done — being only one-third of an ounce to each 

 pound. What is the result if that occurs with all of the butter 

 made in one year by our company? If we have 2 per cent less 

 butter to sell we have 2 per cent less income for butter. Last 

 year our income for butter was practically $500,000.00, 2 per 

 cent of which is $10,000.00. $10,000.00 which might stupidly 

 be allowed to run down the sewer. Now it is not cheating to 

 prevent that loss. The consumer prefers to have the butter 

 with the water in it — a proper amount. 



If you should ask your fruit dealer for a nice apple, you 

 would not appreciate it if instead of a nice juicy apple for your 

 penny, his conscience should prompt him to hand you two dried 

 apples. The amount of water in butter will be determined by 

 the observation of the butter maker, but his observation can be 

 trained and checked by laboratory work. 



Careful watch should be kept for butter-fat in skim-milk and 

 buttermilk. Per cents of milk and cream should be adjusted 

 accurately to the standard set. All of these things are within 

 the range of the every-day creamery man's knowledge. 



The more advanced investigations for bacteria, pus and dirt 

 are probably matters for expert work and we should have at 

 least one laboratory in the State devoted to such research. 



The individual can system is the first requisite for such inves- 

 tigations and I am thankful to say that step has been taken by 

 our association. Under this system every patron's product is 

 available for investigation at any time. Knowledge of this fact 



