DAIRY FARMING. 15 



involves a knowledge of cattle breeding, cattle feeding and giving 

 forage crops in considei'able variety, in addition to the nice work of 

 clean milking, judicious handling of the milk, cream and butter :uid 

 the linal placing of the finished [)roduct on the market. And vet 

 there is nothing in all this to deter a New England yankee from the 

 undertaking, and it will as surely pay better than potato raising as 

 intelligence and skill jtuliciously applied is always sure to pay better 

 than ignorance and inelliciencN' anywhere and everywhere. 



If, in the more or less distant future, the population of our countrv 

 should become many times more dense than it is at present, it is not 

 impossible that animal foods may have to l)e dispensed with, and 

 their places taken by such foods as can be produced directlj- from 

 the soil without the intervention of animals. A forced economj- of 

 food production and food consumi)tion would hardlj' allow the 

 feeding to animals of substances like grain, having already a high 

 food value, and which when converted into beef or pork or poultry 

 shall contain a much smaller food value than when in their original 

 condition. Even now it is diflicult to figure out any real economy 

 in making food from an exclusive grain diet. 



An acre of ground devoted to wheat and producing a full crop 

 of forty bushels, or more, would afford a family over six and a half 

 pounds of grain per day for a year, which when made into bread 

 would be several times increased in weight. An acre of pasture 

 land must be in high condition to keep an ox or steer six months 

 during the summer season, and three hundred pounds of beef, in- 

 cluding bone, would be considered a very satisfactory gain for an ox 

 or steer to make in the six months of pasturing. This would give a 

 famil3' an alloweuce of less than twelve ounces of beef clear of bone 

 per day for a year. 



Pigs fed on grain will require on the average about five pounds of 

 grain to make one of meat, so that true economy would require us 

 to take our grain foods in their original condition. But there is, 

 however, a true economy in using an animal as a machine to convert 

 coarse vegetable products like grass and the straw of grain which 

 neither are nor can be used as human food, and also all waste 

 products which by this means can be returned to us in the form of 

 wholesome and palatable supplies for our tables. To produce 'wheat 

 requires labor, cultivation ; but grass grows spontaneously to a 

 great extent, and its conversion into human food through the medium 

 of the animal requires comparatively little labor, so it is reasonable 



