498 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



more pails at niglit and then afterwards I put on about eight or 

 nine barrels. I don't think it is quite as strong as some years, but 

 it is good. If I thought the corn was a little bit dry, even if not 

 frozen I would put the water on. One of the greatest mistakes is in 

 not getting it into the silo right. You can't put your material in 

 anyway and think you are going to have good silage. 



President : That occupies all the time. It is too bad, because 

 today I think it is one of the most important questions before the 

 dairy people. The next on the program is "The Profitable Dairy 

 Cow," by J. jST. Munsey of Jesup, Iowa. 



THE PROFITABLE COW. 



J. N. Munsey, Jesup, Iowa. 



i 

 If I was president of the United States and was writing an inaugural 

 or message to congress, both of which are synonymous, as you can readily 

 determine by placing the broad generalization in juxtaposition, after 

 I got through writing about rivers and harbors, Indian reservation, negro 

 slavery, trusts, and hard vs. soft coal for live people, I would take up 

 the American cow. That paragraph devoted to this part of national affairs 

 would read: "Uncle Sam milked 25,090,000 cows last year and fed 80,000,- 

 000 of people on butter and oleomargarine. The cow bureau reports won- 

 derful progress in the dairy industry of the United States. If it had not 

 been for the American cow industry thousands of our principal rivers and 

 lakes would have overflowed their banks and millions of pigs would have 

 squealed themselves to death annually. I would call special attention of 

 congress to the large annual production of 150 pounds of butter per cow 

 as something remarkable in the history of our infant nation. The com- 

 mittee appointed to investigate whether in any locality dairymen were de- 

 layed with their spring work by being unable to find the udders in the 

 evening without the aid of lanterns is true in but thirty per cent of the 

 herds examined. Ten thousand editorials written by Latin and Sanskrit 

 scholars would appear the following day commenting on the phenomenal 

 progress of the dairy industry, and congratulating the rural population 

 for possessing cows that secrete such enormous quanties of milk, butter 

 fat, cheese and water. Nine-eighths of the readers of these editorials would 

 say what powerful udders these cows must have to give 150 pounds of 

 butter annually. Everywhere the farming population is beginning to have 

 a just realization of just how hard a cow must have to exert her gizzard 

 and other secretory ducts to give the enormous amount of 150 pounds of 

 butter annually. If I was on the agricultural committee in congress I would 

 introduce a bill providing for the systematic extermination of all cows not 

 reaching 350 pounds of butter annually. If the bill passed I would start 

 President Roosevelt and other rough riders up and down the Mississippi 

 with instructions to scare all the poor cows east and west so that they 



