76 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



better cows. But there is much popular misapprehension as 

 to the influence of feed on milk. If an animal has enough, 

 changes of feed make but little difference in the quality of 

 her milk from day to day. 



This remark is rank heresy to many, but its truth is 

 endorsed by almost every scientific experimenter who care- 

 fully weighs and analyzes. You cannot give the 2.30 horse 

 an extra quart of oats to-day, and expect a record of 2.25 

 to-morrow. You cannot feed an 11 per cent cow to make 

 her become a 14 per cent animal. 



In days past, when the milk of some dairy supplying Bos- 

 ton was below standard, the contractor would write to the 

 producer that he must feed more grain ; and often the 

 farmer found from experience that change of feed did not 

 bring milk up to the standard. 



Professor Whitcher said, before the State Board last 

 year: "When you feed a well-balanced ration to any 

 given cow, it does not make much difference as to the 

 quality of the milk whether you feed one or the other of 

 the rations. If she is a cow that is going to give milk that 

 has 4 per cent of fat in it, she will give that quality of milk 

 and no natural system of feeding will affect the same. I 

 have never found a ration on which I could say I could in- 

 crease or decrease the amount of fat a cow would yield on a 

 normal ration. I feeTconfident that the per cent of fat is not 

 easily varied by changing the food, even by a radical change." 



The Maine station in its 1894 report touches upon some 

 feeding experiments, and in conclusion it says: "The 

 writer cannot resist the temptation to call the attention -of 

 those who believe that the ration largely controls the qual- 

 ity of milk to the fact that, although the cows lost flesh and 

 diminished greatly their product, the quality of the milk 

 seems not to have been influenced." 



The Vermont station .investigated the effect upon milk of 

 practically doubling the grain ration, — i. e., increasing 

 the grain fed from 6 pounds daily to 12 pounds daily, — 

 and found only small changes in the quality of the milk, 

 which could in no way be attributed to the ration. It says 

 that, where foods of equal nutritive value are given, when 



