The Bulletin. 67 



are also in most cases the result of indifferent and inefficient milkers. The 

 milk from each cow should be tested about once a month during the whole 

 period of lactation. A satisfactory way of doing this is to collect what is 

 known as a composite sample, which consists in securing about one-half ounce 

 of milk from each of six consecutive milkings and placing this in a half-pint 

 composite sample jar containing a small amount of preservative. The test of 

 this composite sample will represent the average amount of butter fat for the 

 period during wbich the sample was takeu, and will serve with sufficient accu- 

 •racy as an average test during the entire month. 



By keeping a record of this kind it will be found that the owner of practi- 

 cally every herd is keeping cows which do not pay for their feed, and the only 

 sure way of locating these cows is in keeping records as outlined above. 



Another important matter in the building-up of a dairy herd is to select 

 calves from the best milkers and to call out the poor cows which by the records 

 have been found to be paying either no profit at all or only a small one. The 

 selection of calves from the best cows is the only sure and safe way of making- 

 any permanent improvement in the dairy herd. The practice of continually 

 buying cows is not only costly, but is also a means of introducing contagious 

 diseases into the herd. 



Now, a word with regard to the subject of feeding. I wish to say at the out- 

 set that no dairyman can farm successfully who does not raise his own rough- 

 age. The man who continually depends on cotton-seed meal and cotton-seed 

 hulls can never expect to attain a high degree of success in the dairy, not alone 

 because of the high price of the hulls, but because of the unsatisfactory com- 

 bination of these two feeds. 



The cheapest and most satisfactory roughage that can be produced upon the 

 farm is com silage. Its succulence and palatability make it an ideal feed for 

 milk production. This feed should be available upon the farm the larger por- 

 tion of the year. In the winter it takes the place of some of the pasturage; in 

 the summer and fall it is needed to supplement the shortage of pasturage which 

 usually occurs about this time. 



Cows giving a large flow of milk should be fed an' ample allowance of grain. 

 It always pays to feed a cow to the limit of her capacity. As a rule, 50 per 

 cent of the total nutrients required by a dairy cow is necessary to maintain her 

 own body, so that it will neither gain nor lose in weight. The other 50 per 

 cent is converted into milk. If the farmer, therefore, feeds the cow three- 

 fourths or 75 per cent of the amount of feed that the cow requires for her best 

 milk production, he may in that case expect approximately only one-half the 

 amount of milk that he would get if he supplied the remaining one-fourth or 

 25 per cent of the feed. It is one of the costliest things in the management of 

 a dairy herd to underfeed cows. 



PROFITABLE BUTTER MAKING ON THE FARM. 



By R. L. Shcford, Catawba County. 



To make butter profitable on the farm as well as in the larger dairy we must 

 first have good cows. Every manufacturer of goods on the market knows that 

 in order to make the most profit he has to have the very best machine possible 

 for that business, and it must be kept in the best running condition. Constitu- 

 tional vigor iu a dairy cow, the machine that we have on the farm for doing 

 this dairy work, is something that we cannot pour into an animal with a bot- 

 tle; it has to be bred iu her and fed into her. What are some of the first steps 

 in breeding animals to secure this constitutional vigor we desire and must have 

 to make the most out of our business? 



First, breeding from nothing but strictly healthy animals. We do not want 

 anything but strictly healthy dairy cows to raise dairy stock from. After we 

 have healthy cows we should know their capacity. Everything should be 



