164 DOMESTIC ANIMALS, DAIRYING, ETC. 



quently. Twenty-four to seventy-two hours of such treatment will 

 sometimes save the udder of the most valuable cow in the herd, and 

 the increase in milk for the first month will more than pay for the 

 extra work. 



Milk should not be used until there is no fever in the udder and 

 not until the udder and womb have regained a healthy condition. 

 Ordinarily this will be in about five days ; but if the afterbirth is 

 retained, or there is a flowing from the vagina or severe inflamma- 

 tion of the udder continues, the period is longer, and in exceptional 

 cases the milk may not be fit for use for a month after calving. 



Treatment of the Cow After Calving. After the cow has re- 

 covered from calving, the feed should be gradually increased until 

 the full limit of profitable feeding is reached, and the cow should 

 be pushed to her utmost possible limits for the first three months. It 

 will often pay to give the cow for the first three months after calving 

 more feed than will produce butter at the lowest rate, e. g., if a cow 

 on a certain amount of feed will produce a pound of butter for 7 

 cents for the feed, it may pay to increase the feed 25 per cent to 50 

 per cent, or even double it, though this increase brings the cost of 

 butter up to 8 or 10 cents per pound for feed, if a good increase in 

 yield is obtained, because a high yield during the first months after 

 calving brings an increase through all the months of the milking 

 period, and a cow that is pushed at the beginning of her year will 

 give a good flow longer than one not so treated. 



When other work is pressing, the dairyman is sometimes 

 tempted to let the fresh cow go with the ordinary care and feed until 

 the rush is over, expecting to make up for this neglect by good treat- 

 ment when he is less hurried. He cannot afford to do this, for if a 

 cow starts with a low or moderate milk yield, no amount of care 

 or feed afterward will succeed in securing her best yield. 



Cows will give, and do give milk without any of these careful 

 attentions. A cow will give milk if little attention is paid to drying 

 her up and no cooling and loosening feeds are given before calving. 

 Cows calve every winter without shelter or care, with ice water only 

 to drink, and with no care given to their udders, and yet they give 

 milk. But the best yields and most profitable returns can be ob- 

 tained only by careful attention to every one of these details, and 

 neglect of any one of them frequently cuts down the yield 25 per 

 cent for the year. It is the neglect of many and sometimes all of 

 these details in caring for the cow that makes the average cow yield 

 less than one-third of that produced by the good dairy cow properly 

 handled. 



After the cow has passed the point of greatest flow the feed 

 should be gradually reduced, feeding to produce yield at most profit. 

 Care should be taken to keep her in moderate flesh, and the ration 

 slowly changed until, during the last month of milking, it is similar 

 to that recommended to be fed before calving. (Kan. B. 81.) 



FEEDING DAIRY COWS. 



In the production of milk there are four factors which are of 

 prime economic importance. 1. Cows must be secured which are 



