STATE DAIRY ASSOCIATION. 621 



clean; the bnm was fed according- to quantity of milk, 6 pounds being 

 the most fed to any one cow. The cost of one week's feed for all was: 

 • Silage, $3.50; bran, $2.85; clover hay, $1.47; stover, 42 cents. Total. 

 $8.24. 



The price of silage was estimated at $2.50 per ton; bran, $1G; clo^i-er 

 hay, $0; stover, $2. The butter sold during the seven days was 58 pounds, 

 which at 2!) cents a pound amounted to $16.82 for the week; and deducting 

 the cost of production loft $8.58, or $2.04 for each dollar expended on feed. 

 The amount of milk produced was 1,147 pounds; food cost of 100 pounds 

 milk, 72 cents; for 1 pound l)utter, 14^^ cents; estimated value of skim 

 milk, at 20 cents per 100, $2. We are aware the amount of milk and but- 

 ter is small, and only the good price received for the finished product 

 leaves us a fair margin of profit. 



However, our herd then numbering 11 cows, produced an average of 

 290 pounds butter during the past year, which sold for $77.82 for each 

 cow, and counting the cost of food for a year at $38.00, left us $39.22. 

 Skim milk we count worth $10 a cow more, leaving the heifer calves and 

 manure against the cost of labor. Then we must remember there is a 

 wide dillerence between selling the crops off the farm and in selling them 

 to the cow at market value to be returned to the land in the shape of the 

 manure wherewith to feed next year's corn crop. Then again, by the aid 

 of the skim milk we can, with careful feeding, put our fat hogs on the 

 market twice each year weighing anywhere from 200 to 240 pounds at 

 from five to six months old, a result we could not pretend to reap without 

 the skim milk. Also we must mention the heifer calves growing into 

 cows at an early age to enlarge and improve our dairy herd. We have 

 said nothing of the weekly trips through all weather to sell our produce, 

 nor of all the trials and vexations which attend dairying, but with all 

 these things considered we think we are fairly well compensated by the 

 cow, both for her food and foi' our trouble. 



The Secretary: I can not help saying a word. I have wanted for two 

 years to offer a prize for such an essay, but until this year I was never 

 successful. It seems to me that an essay like that is worth a great deal 

 to this Association. It seems to me there Is one of the most instructive 

 papers that has been presented before this Association, and we know the 

 writer of that paper has been a prize winner in making dairy butter. 



