No. 4.] BREEDS AND VARIETIES. 181 



If vre could have sold it, it would have been worth more. 

 But this would make the proceeds from each cow something 

 over twenty cents per day. Labor does not enter into this 

 calculation, of course, but you see how it stands. Let me 

 recapitulate. We obtained from the butter about sixteen 

 cents ; the skim-milk may have been worth six cents ; making 

 twenty-two cents. The gross cost of feeding was about 

 eighteen cents, but the net cost, after allowing for the 

 manurial value, w^as only about half that sum. So that 

 there is quite a liberal margin to pay for labor, interest on 

 the cost of the cows, and for depreciation. 



Secretary Sessions. Tell us something about the breed 

 of the cows. 



Professor Brooks. We knew nothing about the ancestry 

 of those cows in most cases, but there was quite a variety. 

 One of them we found out afterwards was a pedigree Short- 

 horn. We did not give anything more for her because she 

 had a pedigree. They were good-sized cows, with Short- 

 horn blood in a good many of them ; I should say grade 

 Shorthorn had been the foundation on the maternal side, 

 and that they had been crossed to a considerable extent with 

 Jersey bulls, so that it was a mixture of our own native 

 stock with some Shorthorn and some Jersey blood. 



Question. How many spaces of cream did you get per 

 cow? 



Professor Brooks. In the vicinity of twelve spaces, as a 

 rule. Professor Roberts has had something to say upon one 

 point in regard to which I wanted additional information. 

 He spoke of breeding a young creature so that she should 

 produce her first calf at the age of two years. I judged 

 from his remarks that he proposed to breed her again within 

 a few weeks, so that she would have her second calf per- 

 haps before she was three years old. I have not had much 

 opportunity to test the matter in my own experience, but I 

 had rather got the opinion that it would be better to allow a 

 somewhat lono-er interval between the first and second calf, 

 in order to give a young creature time to grow, and in order 

 also to fix that very valua1)le characteristic of holding out 

 giving milk for a long period ; for I find that the profit 

 depends very largely upon the length of time during which 



