218 DOMESTIC ANIMALS, DAIRYING, ETC. 



The Practical Difficulty. The difficulty has been to devise a 

 system whereby the unprofitable cows might be detected. It is a 

 common belief among farmers that the man who does the milking 

 knows the best cows in the herd, as well as the poorest ; but numer- 

 ous experiments have demonstrated clearly that this belief is not 

 warranted. Many factors enter to lead the judgment astray. The 

 cow which gives a generous flow of milk during the first few weeks 

 of her period of lactation is usually regarded as the best cow. She 

 may soon go down in her flow of milk, and perhaps goes dry for four 

 or five months of the year, but this is not observed, and only the 

 memory of the large flow she gave when fresh lingers in the mind of 

 the owner. 



Another cow may give only a fair flow of milk when she first 

 comes in, and may not be regarded highly by her owner; but she 

 may continue at the same rate of yield for a long period, and 

 will in the end prove a great deal more valuable than the other cow. 

 No milker can tell, without weighing the milk regularly, whether 

 a cow gives 6,000 or 8,000 pounds of milk in a year; still the differ- 

 ence may prove the difference between profit and loss on that par- 

 ticular cow 



When the milk is valued according to its butterfat content 

 unsupported estimates of the cow's performance are still more un- 

 certain. It requires frequent testing to ascertain the average per- 

 centage of fat in the milk a cow yields; the test may vary greatly 

 from milking to milking and from day to day. There may also 

 be a great variation in the richness of the milk yielded by a cow 

 when she is fresh as compared with a time later in the period of 

 lactation. 



The First American Association. The cow-testing movement 

 in the United States was inaugurated at Fremont, Mich., September 

 26, 1905, under the name of the Newaygo County Dairy Testing As- 

 sociation. The general purpose for which it was formed was to pro- 

 mote the dairy interests of its members, and particularly to provide 

 means and methods for testing the milk of the cows of the members 

 periodically. It consisted of 31 members, and 239 cows completed 

 the first year's test. The officers of the association consisted of a 

 president, a vice-president, a secretary and treasurer, and a board of 

 nine directors. This board had the management of the business of 

 the association and employed a cow tester, who made nionthly visits 

 to each herd, and as there are only twenty-six working days in a 

 month, it was necessary for him in some cases to test two herds in 

 one day. 



Methods of Operation. The cow tester arrives at the farm in the 

 afternoon and remains there for twenty-four hours, when he is car- 

 ried by the farmer to the farm of the next member in the association. 



On his arrival at the stable the cow tester enters in a book which 

 he carries for this purpose the name and number of each cow in the 

 herd, whether she gives milk or not. As it is the purpose of the work 

 to ascertain the actual status of the whole herd, as well as of the indi- 

 vidual, every cow in the stable should be entered on the list. It is ob- 



