226 



Missouri Agricultural Report. 



Milking in Denmarlt. 



The COWS are put into the stable in the fall and not let out again 

 imtil the following spring. They are fed all the straw they will eat, 

 and, on the average, 4 poimds of hay, 40 to 100 pounds of roots, and 

 about 6 pounds of grain per day, consisting of oil cake, bran, barley 

 and oats — the grain being fed according to the milk flow. 



]Many of the dairymen on the 

 small farms milk three times a 

 day. having ten cows to the milker. 

 On the large farms they usually 

 milk but twice a day having from 

 fifteen to twenty cows to the 

 milker, requiring two and one- 

 half hours, night and morning, to 

 do the milking. 



The cows are allowed to go drA 

 from six to eight weeks. To sup- 

 ply the Danish export trade of 

 butter, an even flow of milk is re- 

 quired the year roimd, and most 

 of the cows freshen from September to May. The male calves and any 

 heifers not needed for future cows are sold for veal at from three to 

 four w^eks old. Calves are not allowed to suckle their dams. They are 

 fed whole milk for the first week. After this it is gradually changed 

 to skim milk and this is fed to the heifers imtil they are four to six 

 months old. From this time on they are raised on pasture during the 

 summer, and in winter are given hay, straw and roots, and sometimes a 

 little oil cake. 



cow TESTING ASSOCIATION. 



The first co-operative cow testing association was organized in 



1895. Later these proved so help- 

 ful a factor in weeding out the 

 unprofitable cows, that they have 

 increased rapidly, until at the 

 present time there are about five 

 hundred associations in operation. 

 A man is employed by each asso- 

 ciation to visit the farms and do 

 the testing every three weeks. He 

 weighs the milk of each cow and 

 keeps an accurate record of the 

 feed consumed, so that at the close 



Returning from millving cows at tether 

 Laborer's cottage in bacliground. 



