104 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



that the3' require in butter dairying. From reports we get from the 

 patrons*of clifTerent factories, it is found that the returns from the milk 

 of a good cow, delivered at the factor}', will average I'vom forty to 

 fifty dollars per cow for the season. With the additional sura re- 

 ceived from the sale of calves and butter, the net profits are found 

 nearl}' up to the butter dairy. 



Then another branch of stock husbandry is the raising of stock 

 for the dairy and for beef, which we claim can be made a source of 

 profit, though we ma}' fail to prove it. We are ready to admit that 

 a portion of the stock that is raised throughout the State paA's only 

 a very small profit, if an}-, for we raise too much of the scrub stock, 

 and then feed it too poorl}' to make the business profitable. 



Let us take into consideration the course that is pursued b}' some 

 in raising their stock. In the first place the calf receives a small 

 amount of skimmed milk dailj^ for a few weeks and then they are 

 turned off to shirk for themselves until snow comes, when they are 

 taken to the barn and fed on coarse fodder that is not worth any- 

 thing to sell. At a j'ear old the}- are not any heavier than they 

 ought to have been when a few weeks of age. If given a good 

 pasture the second summer they make some growth, and come to 

 the barn in fair flesh, only to pass another winter fed on poor hay 

 and straw. The}' are sold the next fall at 2| years old at such 

 prices as their owners can get, which will be from $15 to $25, or 

 say an aA'erage of S20. This, we admit cannot give but a very 

 small profit for the three tons of fodder they have consumed in 

 two winters, and pasturage two summers will amount to from $15 

 to $20, so the profits must come from the plant food left on the 

 farm. The dressed weight of this class of beef will average about 400 

 pounds, and sells at the present time at about $-1.00 per hundred 

 pounds. The daily growth of these animals from their birth has 

 been less than eight ounces a day. If these same animals had 

 received a daily ration of concentrated food with their coarse fodder, 

 which would have made a standard feed, or had been fed the good 

 hay their owners were selling for $13 per ton, they would have 

 weighed on an average eight hundred pounds each instead of four 

 hundred, and would have been worth eight dollars per hundred in 

 the market and would sell on the foot at an average of $G0 each. 

 Allowing they have consumed three tons of good hay or its equiva- 

 lent, which is worth at the barn $10 per ton — $30, and cost of 

 pasturing $10, then the animal has cost $10 ; thus giving a profit of 



