CM ANNUAL. REPORT OF THE Off. Doc. 



oow. On quality depends consumption, and on consumption depends 

 price and profit. All this depends on the man behind the cow. 

 Then, besides, the character of the cow herself depends on his in- 

 telligence, discernment and enterprise. 



The dairy farmer is the man at the switch sending the train along 

 the right track or stalling it on a siding. 



We hare only to think this business of dairying out to its roots 

 and branches to see that all the forces of education, law and public 

 opinion should be enlisted to make the dairy farmer understand his 

 own importance to the whole, and fully and thoroughly understand 

 what it means to be a dairy laruKn* of today. 



In thousands of instances the love of money, larger profit, better 

 reward, is not enough to make thinkers of unthinking men, who keep 

 cows and unprofitably fill the place of a profitable dairy farmer. 

 And so there must be constant agitation of the subject: constant 

 stirring of thought, constant holding of conventions and institutes; 

 constant reading and study, that if possible, these men who keep cows 

 and do not realize what dairying means, may be reached and lifted up 

 until they can see the question in its true light. 



Think of the great width of this question. Think of the vast army 

 of men it supports from the farm to the creamery and cheese factory ; 

 of the thousands of dealers and commission merchants; of the manu- 

 facturers of machinery and dairy supplies; of the great transporta- 

 tion interests on both sea and land that look to it for sustenance. 

 Then think of the millions of consumers who wait upon the cow and 

 all these intermediaries for their daily food. The cow makes it 

 right, pure and good. If there is anything wrong with it, it comes 

 from the ignorance, indifference and willful neglect of the men who 

 stand between the cow and the consumer. Chief among these is the 

 farmer. He must be held to the largest responsibility for he has 

 the most to do with the milk at the time of its greatest liability to 

 bad impressions. At every stage beyond him modern science has 

 done more to perfect the way than it has at the farm, and this for 

 the reason that farmers, as a class, have not believed in science. 

 They have not taken an educated mental interest in their business. 

 The domain of science is in the mind and farmers have had but 

 little mind for it. Hence, they do not see how it bears upon their 

 work. The greatest problem in agriculture today is to get the 

 farmer to see where science touches him and his life work and so 

 take advantage of what she has to give. 



Right here lies the larger meaning of dairy farming. I have 

 spoken thus in a general sense so we may take a larger view for a 

 moment of the great field dairying occupies and the necessity that 

 exists that the dairy farmer should comprehend well his own relation 

 to it. I have selected a few special lines to talk upon that bear most 

 sharply upon the farmer. First of these is the breeding of the right 

 kind of a cow for his work. Do you know that when we come to 

 study into this question, it is absolutely appalling to see what enor- 

 mous losses the farmers of the country sustain because they will 

 persist in breeding and keeping cows unfit for dairy work. 



Hoard's Dairyman has spent |3,0fl0 in taking cow censuses in ten 

 states, from Iowa and Minnesota all the way to New England. In 

 several of these states such as Wisconsin, Ohio and New York, 

 several censuses have been taken. As accurate study as possible 

 was made of each cow, in each herd, and a statement made of what 



