I907-] DISCUSSION. 183 



hope that the time will come when they will give us a state 

 standard. There is no question but what those that will 

 furnish a first-rate article can get good prices for it. 



The President. I cannot keep still on this subject. If 

 you want to improve the quality of milk, I say strike at the 

 root of this matter. Go through the cow stables and strike 

 at the root of the trouble. 



Mr. W. L. Mitchell. I will tell you what the trouble is 

 there, the farmer feels that he does not get paid for having 

 a clean stable. I handle a good deal of milk, and I have been 

 in some stables that badly needed attention, but as the market 

 stands now there is not very much inducement for a farmer to 

 spend much money in putting in new improvements provided 

 he is only producing a small quantity of milk. There is not 

 much inducement for the ordinary farmer that is keeping just 

 a few cows, and sells whatever milk he may have over what his 

 family wants. I expect we are not coming anywhere near up 

 to the proper standard. Where a man, however, is producing 

 any quantity of milk I think it is a radically different matter. 

 There are a good many milkmen in the cities who would be 

 glad to get that milk, and it would be an easy matter for them 

 to conduct a little campaign of education and educate their 

 customers up to paying for a good sanitary clean product, so 

 that the producers can meet the extra cost of producing that 

 kind of milk. I do not know how much it would be. It might 

 be a cent a quart, or possibly not more than half a cent, but 

 I think the brother over here on my left is all right in what 

 he said about the stable. There is where the principal difficulty 

 lies. Of course, a good many farmers do not know how to 

 properly take care of their milk. Milk for market wants to 

 be promptly taken care of. You have got to begin right at the 

 stable, for the first twenty minutes after that milk is drawn 

 from the cows tells a majority of the story. The animal heat 



