394 Missouri Agricultural Report. 



cows. Walking as closely together as possible, single file (each cow 

 occupying but eight feet in the line) they will string out more than 

 a mile and a half in driving up from the station. It will take the 

 biggest part of an hour for them to pass through the gate at a 

 steady walk. Standing as closely together as they can be crowded, 

 they would fill 21/2 acres of yard, but a five-acre yard would be too 

 small to accommodate them properly. A barn thirty-two feet wide 

 for two rows of cows, and with stalls three feet three inches wide, 

 would have to be 103 rods long to house this herd. It would extend 

 nearly around the four sides of a five-acre lot and would cost a 

 matter of $40,000 — but it would save fencing. If the cows were 

 to run loose in a covered barn lot, three acres would have to be 

 covered. Eighty-five good milkers could handle this herd easily. 

 Fifteen hundred acres of pasture ought to be plenty for grazing. 

 To feed these cows a ton and a quarter of hay per cow would re- 

 quire a rick twelve feet wide and twelve feet high and nearly a 

 mile long, or almost three times around the five-acre lot — providing 

 a great wind-break. Eight hundred acres of meadow should pro- 

 duce this hay. Forty 100-ton silos would be sufficient. 



One would certainly realize that he was in "big business" driv- 

 ing up these 1,021 cows and milking them on a sweltering night in 

 fly-time — yet this is the size of the "business" as to profit that one- 

 fourth of the 1,000,000 cows in Illinois are doing today. 



All this to equal twenty-five really good cows and get $783 

 profit !. This herd could be very well managed on a 3,000-acre farm 

 of good land. A dairyman having a bank account of $100,000 or 

 so could keep these cows, but they would be a bit dangerous for the 

 common dairyman to handle. But he is handling them in smaller 

 numbers and doesn't see the danger, because their worthlessness 

 is hid behind the high production of the good cows in the herd. 



Many dairymen of Illinois have accommodations for 80 cows. 

 To equal that number of good cows, averaging 301 pounds of but- 

 ter fat, would require a herd of 3,266 cows and accommodations 

 about three times as large as here indicated. 



The profitless cow is a real and living issue and a large one 

 in dairying for bread and butter. One of the greatest and easiest 

 steps of improvement in the dairy business today is to discover and 

 weed out these poor cows. Isn't it time to stop guessing at these 

 vital elements in the profit of the dairy business and to find out 

 for sure — by weighing and testing the milk — what each individual 

 cow is earning for the owner. 



We all know there is a difference in dairy herds as well as in 



