184 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



prices. Just so long as j'our best butter makers are getting less 

 than 75 cents a pound for their butter, there will be room here for 

 experiments and the reporters of experiments, and for the com- 

 paring of notes one butter maker with another. 



We will begin with the producers of ''the best butter," and then 

 consider their product. The Jerse}' cow is a more profitable butter 

 producer than is the cow of an}' other breed. The Jersey cow 

 averages more butter for a day, for a week, for a month, for a year 

 and for a life time, than do the cows of any other breed. We have 

 reliable records of nearly three pounds and a half a day ; of 21, 22, 

 23, 24 and 2.5 pounds a week ; of 183 pounds in 61 days; of 400, 

 500, 600, 700, 705 and 778 pounds in a year. Major Brown's 

 '•Butter Tables," published in the Country Gentleman last year, 

 give us tests between 22 and 26 pounds a week for three cows ; 

 between 20 and 22 pounds a week for four cows ; between 18 and 

 20 pounds per week for seven cows ; between 16 and 18 pounds per 

 week for fortj^-one cows, and between 14 and 16 pounds per week 

 for ninety-two cows. Since these tables were published, numerous 

 additions have been made to them, and in all of the classes. 



It mav be said that a couple of hundred butter tests are a small 

 number, when compared with the thousands of Jerse}' cows in this 

 country ; but it must be borne in mind that these tests are all for a 

 period of a week or more, and are confined to A. J. C. C. H. R. 

 cows, and no one will appreciate the labor of testing a single cow 

 carefulh' for her butter yield for a week more full}- than he, or she, 

 who has made such tests. AVheu one cow is kept, or even two or 

 three, it is ver}' hard to find the time when all the milk and cream 

 of the best cow can be spared for a week ; and in large dairies 

 there is so much work to be done that it is b}' no means an eas}" 

 tiling to have a particular cow milked fourteen times l)v the same 

 person, and this milk brought to the milk-room separately and set 

 and skimmed, and the cream ripened and churned and the butter 

 worked and weighed separately ! And to continue this testing week 

 after week for several months or for a year is a work of ver}- con- 

 siderable labor and expense. Nevertheless this, in whole or in 

 part, is what every breeder and every butter-maker ought to do for 

 each one of his cows and at various periods of their lives. It is 

 the foundation of breeding for l)utter, and it is the only way b^' 

 which butter-making can be made to pa}'. 



