No. 6. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURB. 196 



CLEANLINESS IN THE DAIRY. 



Wherever dairying obtains twice a day all over the dairy districts 

 dirty men, dirtily clad, take dirty pails into dirty ©tables and milk 

 dirty cows. The clean, pare milk as it streams from the teats be- 

 comes fonl at once, contaminated by its surroundings. It may make 

 good butter even then, but the chances that it will not do so are 

 greatly enhanced by its contact with dirt. Does it pay to be cleanly 

 in the dairy? I do not advocate extreme care under common dairy 

 conditions, but there is certainly room for much improvement. We 

 card our cows at the station. Does it pay? Yes and no. It does 

 not add a pound of milk or an ounce of butter to the yield; but it aids 

 us in making a high grade of product. 



I have in mind a milkman in a Vermont city who started in some 

 years ago with the idea of making clean milk in cleanly surroundings. 

 His competitors derided him and said, ''You can't afford to take the 

 care of your stables you do, or to keep the cows in so cleanly a condi- 

 tion.'' What was the result? He has much the largest trade of any 

 nnlkman in the city. He states that he hardly ever loses a bill, be- 

 cause he deals with the best trade in the city. It pays the milkman; 

 it pays ihe farmer; it pays anyone to endeavor to keep everything 

 pertaining to milk in as cleanly a way as practicable; if not now, 

 some day. 



A Maine dairyman has said that next to a dead dog a coat of white- 

 wash was most needed on dairy farms. Whitewashing adds to the 

 sense of cleanliness as well as to its actuality; and it serves to prompt 

 a man to better practice. 



BETTER PRODUCTS. 



Milk. — One Indian summer day in the middle of last November, 

 coming north from a meeting of chemists at Washington. I stopped 

 off at iS'ewark, N. J., and went bv trollev car a dozen miles to see 

 a herd of GOO cows which made milk for the city trade. On arrival 

 I was shown into the dairy room. In due time a bell rung and I 

 went across to one of the barns. The milkers came in from the fields. 

 Every man took off his soiled clothes, w'ashed his face, hands and 

 hair most thoroughly, cleaned his nails, using a scrubbing brush, 

 put on a white duck suit w-hich had been steamed and boiled that 

 morning to cleanse it. These men, having dressed with more care 

 than most men dress for th'e parlor, took steamed and sterilized 

 milk pails and went upstairs into the cow parlor. The cows were 

 bedded well and carefully' cared for. The manure w^as fre(iuently re- 

 moved from the barn into the cellar below. A file of a dozen milkers 

 marched down one of the long alleys, almost with the precision of a 

 military company, and began milking. A barn man had preceded 

 them, had got the cows up, and had brushed off bellies, flanks and 

 udders. The milk was milked into strained pails. Every effort was 



