16 . Bulletin 81 



necticut-Storrs-station standards. ) It should be said, however, that the 

 latter two standards take cognizance of the amount of the milk flow and 

 its call upon the food supply as a factor in formulation. This important 

 step in advance meets one of the principal objections urged in the past 

 against the old Wolff standard. 



2. Practicable standards — Formulas for profit. — The "physiological 

 standards " contemplate maximum production only, cost being a secondary 

 consideration. Yet the ration making the most may not be the most profit- 

 able. The various factors just mentioned as not entering into the makeup of 

 the physiological standard are vitally important to the farmer ; and 

 these factors are variable one year with another, one place with another. 

 Rations which may prove practicable and profitable, as well as fitted to 

 animal needs, in New England may be ill adapted to the conditions in Col- 

 orado. Indeed profit may follow quite diverse lines of feeding in the 

 hill towns of Vermont from what would be advisable in the valleys. It 

 may, for instance, pay better in some cases to grow more and to buy less, to 

 feed a relatively wide ration, thus making less product but perhaps more 

 profit. 



It is plain that no set " standards " have been or can be formulated to 

 fit such variable circumstances. At times the old Wolff ration, again the 

 Wolff-Lehmann or Storrs standards, or, indeed, often, neither of these may 

 suit certain conditions of feeds and values. Prolonged careful observation 

 of feeding practice and experimentation may throw more light on this 

 phase of the question, but at present it is safe to say that the practicable — 

 because profitable — standard must be worked out for each feeder, each 

 herd, each set of conditions independently, by close study of physiological 

 needs, home and market resources and individual animals. 



3. Average standards — Average feeding rations. — These are simply the 

 reduction to a mathematical expression of the average practice of intelligent 

 feeders, just as averages tell us that the average adult American male is five 

 feet eight inches tall and weighs 155 pounds. " Standards " thus con- 

 structed may or may not be wisely used. The writer feels that they are 

 more beneficial as information than as guides, and, it should be remem- 

 bered, this is all that is claimed for at least one of the so-called "standards." 

 Under this head may be classed the "standards" proposed by the Wiscon- 

 sin, 1 the Connecticut (Storrs) 2 and the Michigan 3 stations as results respect- 

 ively of the feeding practice of 128 and 32 herds and of a single herd. The 

 latter case is perhaps hardly to be thus classified and in its place it may be 

 found to be a practicable and profitable standard. 



i Wis. Sta. Bui. 38 (1894). 



2 Conn. (Storrs) Sta. Rpt. 9, pp. 17-66 (1897). 



3 Mich. Sta. Bui. 149, pp. 85-96 (1897). 



