654 



DAIRY 



Dairy is a word used in speaking of a number 

 of cows kept for milking purposes, or to indicate 

 the buildings in which Milk ( q. v. ) is sold or manu- 

 factured into Cheese ( q. v. ) or Butter ( q. v. ). The byre 

 or cow-house should be connected by a covered way 

 with the rnilk-house proper, and the arrangements 

 for ventilation made so perfect that it should not 

 be possible to detect in the vicinity of the milk any 

 smell from the cows, pigs, or other source. , The 

 milk-house should on no pretext be made a common 

 storeroom for meat, game, onions, or any material 

 which will taint the air and then the milk and the 

 cheese or butter, as the case may be. The first 

 essential in a dairy is the absolute cleanness not 

 only of the floors and walls of the building, but of 

 all its furnishings. This is secured by daily wash- 

 ing and by the scalding or steaming of all vessels 

 or implements which come in contact with milk 

 or its products ; the object being to destroy the 

 microbes which live and multiply in milk and 

 bring about its acidity and decay. The thermo- 

 meter in the dairy should stand at 55 F. in sum- 

 mer, and 60 F. in winter. At temperatures higher 

 than these milk is liable to spoil, owing to the 

 greater activity of the above-mentioned germs ; 

 many degrees below this it gets chilled, and will 

 not manipulate satisfactorily. An abundant supply 

 of pure water is necessary, and means for boiling 

 water must also be provided, not only to secure 

 scalding water for washing, but to raise, when 

 necessary, the temperature of the products of milk 

 during manufacture, or maintain a suitably high 

 temperature in the air of the cheese-room or the 

 milk-house. A small steam or gas engine is 

 frequently employed in a dairy conducted on a 

 large scale, to supply the power necessary for a 

 centrifugal Cream Separator (q.v.), also for churn- 

 ing whole milk or cream, and at times for driving 

 the compressed-air refrigerator. The latter is used 

 to lower the temperature of vaults in which fresh, 

 summer-made butter is stored until the winter 

 season, when the prices for good ' grass ' butter are 

 high. As the cost of the necessary machinery is 

 considerable, the method can only be made to pay 

 when the business is extensive. 



Dairying has developed much within recent 

 years. The growing demand for milk in large 

 towns has increased the volume of the milk-trade, 

 and modified the system of management. Summer 

 dairying, while suitable for the making of cheese, 

 and so far for butter also, must be supplemented 

 by winter dairying to keep up the supply of milk 

 and fresh butter throughout the year. 1 or summer 

 dairying it is usually arranged tnat the cows calve 

 during March, April, and May, so that they go to 

 pasture when they are coming to the period at 

 which, with a proper supply of succulent food and 

 suitable surroundings, they should develop their 

 greatest yield of milk. They lie out day and night, 

 and have the Avhole summer and early autumn before 

 them the period in which grass, the most natural 

 food of a cow, is most abundant, best, and cheapest. 

 In some instances the grass is supplemented by 2 or 

 3 Ib. a day of cotton -seed or other cake, and when 

 the grass begins to fail in autumn, some variety of 

 green food, as cabbages, rape, vetches, &c. As 

 frost begins to appear the cows are housed at night, 

 and in spite of liberal and careful feeding, fall off 

 in their yield of milk. Nevertheless, it is the better 

 practice to house them in good time, because they 

 keep in better condition during winter than if left 

 out too long, and for the few remaining weeks of 

 the milking period they give a larger average 

 return. All naturally ' dry off,' some more rapidly 

 than others. Milking should be stopped abruptly at 

 the end of the year experience points to this being 

 the best and simplest method of drying off cows 

 at this season. After two or three months of rest, 



the cows calve, and this goes on year by year from 

 the age of two or three (depending upon size and 

 condition) until ten years old, when all should, 

 without exception, be replaced by heifers. A ring 

 appears on the horn to mark each year after the 

 third year, and by this the age can be determined. 



Where winter dairying is also practised, the cows 

 are made to calve at all times of the year, so that 

 a number come in possibly every week, to replace 

 others that have ceased to milk satisfactorily. The 

 temperature of the cow-bouse has to be maintained 

 at such a high point, to keep up the full flow of 

 milk during winter, and the feeding is made so 

 forcing and unnatural that the constitutions of cows 

 would show the effects of this high-pressure system 

 if they were kept to calve another year. In conse- 

 quence, few farmers who adopt this system of 

 management retain their cows more than one milk- 

 ing period. They shut them in the house both 

 summer and winter, and give a full supply of food 

 all the while, to maintain their condition. Some 

 send them to auction as soon as the yield of milk 

 falls to the net cost of its production. Others 

 attempt to feed the cows after this until they put 

 on flesn, so that they command a higher total price 

 and a higher rate per stone in the fat market 

 than ordinary milking cows. Unquestionably 

 the system of changing cows after one milking 

 period pays farmers who are favourably situated for 

 the disposal of milk to private families, better than 

 keeping them for a number of years and ' bringing 

 them round ' to calve each season ; yet there is one 

 serious drawback as regards the suspension of the 

 improvement of dairy cattle, by neglecting the 

 selection of calves for rearing from the oest milking 

 mothers. The system is only possible, without 

 doing serious injury to the breeds of cattle, because 

 it is not general throughout the country, but con- 

 fined to dairies supplying milk to large centres of 

 population. 



Eight to ten cows is a sufficient number for each 

 milker, and the operation should be performed as 

 quietly and as expeditiously as possible. Men are 

 usually employed in England, and women in Scot- 

 land. When cows give a large flow of milk, or 

 when it is wanted for town consumption, milking 

 is done thrice daily ; but in the great majority of 

 cases throughout the country it is only performed 

 morning and evening. Heavy milking cows con- 

 sume a large quantity of water, which should be 

 supplied to them at least twice daily. COAVS not 

 in milk are often allowed to drink only once a day, 

 though it would be better to let them do so twice. 

 To offer tepid water to a cow immediately after 

 calving is an unnatural and altogether unnecessary 

 precaution ; she should have cold, but not iced, 

 water in small quantities, and given frequently 

 until she is satisfied. Cows consuming a large 

 amount of sloppy food and roots do not require 

 much water. 



It is important that the water should be pure and 

 clean. Outbreaks of typhoid fever among children 

 have been traced to cows drinking water contam- 

 inated with the germs of this disease. Though 

 sewage irrigation grass is extensively used, under 

 the ' soiling ' system, by cowfeeders near to towns 

 ( Edinburgh, for example), no injurious results have 

 been traced to this practice. Irrigation grass has been 

 largely superseded within recent years by supplies 

 of better quality got from immense crops of Italian 

 ryegrass ( Lolivm italicum ), grown without irriga- 

 tion by means of heavy and repeated dressings of 

 nitrate of soda. In no place can this system be 

 seen to greater perfection than around Edinburgh. 

 In some parts clover and vetches take the place of 

 ryegrass. Succulent food is essential for the pro- 

 duction of large returns of milk. As the grass 

 season ends in October, the succulent portion of 



