TENTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK— PART VIII 371 



respected as well as the minister and the banker of the town. Circulate 

 the spirit of good fellowship among one another and while we live let 

 us be happy for when we are dead we are dead all over. 



President: Our next subject is something I feel is worth con- 

 sideration. There is nothing that will help out the quality more 

 than farm sanitation. Our vice-president will talk to you on this 

 subject. IMr. Stephenson: 



FARM SANITATION, 



F. W. STEPHENSON, LAMONT, IOWA. 



Mr. President, Ladies and Fellow Creamerymen: 



There have been so many things pass over my mind since attending 

 this convention that it is difficult for me to concentrate my mind on the 

 subject of "Farm Sanitation." 



I grew up to manhood on the farm and spent several yoars there 

 since I became a man before I took up the creamery work. There is 

 nothing I enjoy better than tilling the soil, planting the seed and watch- 

 ing nature develop it. There are three things that come to my mmci. 

 One is the silo — the food product, another is the breeding of the herd, 

 and the next is sanitation. You realize, brother patrons, that no man 

 can make a fine piece of butter without he has good raw material. You 

 will remember, possibly, what Mr. Odell said last year at the state con- 

 vention in Waterloo in regard to the condition of many hand separators 

 on the farm. I will tell you it is a shame. What we need at the pres- 

 ent time is not a buttermaker able to make 97% butter, but 97% milk 

 and cream from which to make the butter. I wish I could have the 

 honor Mr. Brunner has, but I can not get it. If I did I would possibly 

 be like the. Democrat who, when a heavy storm came up, climbed into a 

 hollow tree. He stood thcx-e congratulating himself on the fact that he 

 was out of the rain. When the storm was over he tried to get out but 

 couldn't. Then he happened to think that he was a Democrat and be- 

 gan to shrivel down until he was so small he walked right out. 



I am going to speak to the buttermakers this afternoon, looking at 

 this matter from a buttermaker's standpoint. I believe I am safe in 

 saying that 50 per cent of the farmers today are farming the same as 

 they did 25 years ago. I believe feed is costing them as much money 

 cr more than it did then. Can they afford to do it? Remember this. The? 

 have three times the money invested in the same farm they had 25 

 years ago. They are raising practically no more to the acre than they 

 were then. You will agree with me, I think, when I tell you it takes two 

 acres of pasture to pasture a cow. It takes about two acres of meadow 

 to furnish hay or rough feed for her, and it takes nearly another two 

 acres to raise corn enough for her a year. The average acreage, I be- 

 lieve, in the State of Iowa will produce nine tons of silage to the acre. 

 I am told that eight tons of silage will feed a cow 365 days where one 

 or two acres of hay will not furnish rough feed enough. There is a sav- 

 ing of about four acres of your land. 



