148 Thirty-Fifth Annual Report of the 



daily and their exposure to the germ destroying sunlight, the 

 ventilation of the tie-up, drainage of the milk room and cleanliness 

 of the hands as -well as cows at milking time. Only in maintain- 

 ing uniform conditions throughout can a uniform product be pos- 

 sible, therefore the importance of urging seeming trifles so 

 forcibly. 



Ask your butter maker to do his duty and insist that it be 

 done in every particular, but be sure that no obstacles are placed 

 in his path by your own failure to attend to your duties. 



Just outside the path of direct connection between the pasture 

 or hay mow and the butter maker there enters a problem vital to 

 the dairyman, for in proportion to his appreciation of its under- 

 lying principles rests the future of the industry. We cannot 

 divest ourselves of that commercialism which measures the value 

 of every industry or section by its crucial test of figures. 



In the strenuous life we are living there is no opportunity 

 for estimates or guesses and to measure with accuracy, the cost of 

 production as well as manufacture must be more completely com- 

 passed. A great field opens before the ambitious dairy worker 

 and the day for averages and estimates has gone. 



Profitable dairy cows are not accidents but the legitimate 

 outcome of generations of careful systematic breeding. The 

 growth of the dairy industry may be read in the history of the 

 dairy cows of the past fifty years. That history is cumulative 

 and each generation contributes its quota of facts according to 

 the energy and insight of the dairymen. Animals are responsive 

 creatures. The objective mind of the breeder must ever dominate 

 the subjective mind of the animal, and it is along this path- 

 way of subjection that individuals and herds have been led, not 

 driven, bear that in mind, led to present attainments. You can 

 force fat on the hog but milk and butter fat come by invitation. 

 Measure the industry from the standard of the best and a 

 problem of startling proportions presents itself. Dairying has 

 altogether too long been cursed by averages, for averages al- 

 ways reduce the volume of product and trig the wheels of 

 progress. The average for Vermont is probably about 150 lbs. 

 per cow. The output of the best individuals from five to six 

 hundred pounds yearly. 



He who measures his herd by total production and finds 

 an average is boarding dead wood in his tie-up. Men must be 

 measured as individuals. Not in concrete masses can humanity 

 be lifted but by and through individual activity. The next step 

 in dairy work deals with the individualism of individuals and 

 when the cows of Vermont or Maine stand upon their indi- 

 vidual platforms the total volume of product will be materially 

 increased and, what is of far greater consequence, the steps 



