1835.] 



FARMERS' REGISTER. 



77 



ers, however, to save time, or to prevent the risk 

 of the plants springing again, burn them in little. 

 heaps upon the ground at the time of iheir being 

 collected, and spread the ashes upon the surface. 

 This may be sometimes convenient, but the effect 

 is, that the principal nutritive part of the plant is 

 dissipated, and nothing left but. the carbonaceous, 

 earthy, and other insoluble matter. 



Extracts from the last edition of the "Complete Grazier." 



ON THE ECONOMY AND MANAGEMENT OF 

 THE DAIRY. 



On the produce of a Dairy. 



The produce of a dairy is to be regarded in a 

 two-fold view, as it respects quantity and value. 

 Both depend in a great degree, upon management; 

 for if the cow be injudiciously treated, or the but- 

 ter and cheese be badly made, both the product 

 and the price will be materially diminished. There 

 is no part of farming more steadily profitable than 

 the dairy; but, at the same time, none demands 

 greater judgement and attention. 



Of the three objects of the dairy — selling the 

 milk, or, as it is commonly called, cow-keeping; 

 making butter and cheese; and suckling; — the first 

 is generally the most profitable, at the usual price 

 obtained tor the milk. It can, however, be only 

 carried on in the immediate vicinity of large 

 towns; and even there, the expense of providing 

 fodder, and the fluctuations ot its price, while that 

 of milk seldom changes, together with the injury 

 to the health and consequent value of their cows, 

 from the close confinement to which they are usu- 

 ally subjected, and the nature of the food supplied 

 for the purpose of producing an extraordinary 

 flow of milk, often render it a hazardous, and al- 

 ways an unpleasant business. 



The making of butter and cheese, which may 

 be distinctively termed the dairy, ranks next in 

 the scale of profit; though we cannot but observe 

 that this is contradicted in a late and very minute 

 account of an extensive farm in the Vale of 

 Berkeley, published under the sanction of the So- 

 ciety for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge.* 

 However this may be, a well fed cow, of a good 

 breed, will produce, on an average, 180 lbs. of 

 butter in the season; and this, where there is an 

 immediate market for it while fresh, together with 

 tiie value of the skim-milk, either in feeding pigs 

 or making skim-milk cheese, will pay better than 

 cheese alone. The common calculation is, indeed, 

 150 lbs.;+ but this is made upon mixed stock, 



* See the Report of the Gloucestershire Farms, No 

 IV. in the twenty-first number of the Farmer's Series 

 of the Library of Useful Knowledge. 



t In the Sussex Agricultural Survey there is an ac- 

 count of the produce of the Duke of Richmond's 

 dairy; from which it appears that the cows, all Suffolk, 



Eroduced an average of only 136 lbs. in the season; 

 ut it does not mention how they were fed; probably 

 they were pastured in the park. 



The same survey mentions a Sussex cow, that for 

 some weeks after calving gave ten pounds of butter, 

 and twelve pounds of cheese per week; and another is 

 mentioned in the Hampshire Report that yielded from 

 fifteen to sixteen pounds of butler, during part of the 

 season: besides many other instances of equally extra- 

 ordinary produce. 



which afford no certain data. In the Epping dis- 

 trict, where no particular attention is paid to the 

 selection of stock, and where there is an indis- 

 criminate mixture of Devon, Suffolk, Leicester, 

 Holderness, and Scotch, the calculation, in a well 

 managed dairy, amounts to 212 lbs. 



viz: 



6 lbs. per week, during twenty-six weeks 156 

 4 lbs. per week, during iburteen weeks 56* 



In forty weeks, which is full lour weeks sooner 

 than they need be generally allowed to go dry, 

 and there is no doubt that, with proper care in the 

 choice of the cows, and proper pasture to support 

 them, that calculation would be supported in good 

 years; it might not in parching seasons, but then 

 all dairy produce must suffer equally. Mr. Aiton's 

 calculation is, as Ave have already seen, 250 lbs. 

 per annum; but that is for the best milkers of a 

 very superior stock, and although it may be diffi- 

 cult to reach that quantity in any other than a very 

 select dairy, yet there can be little doubt that, with 

 proper attention to breed and feeding, the Epping 

 average may be maintained. 



The same gentleman calculates that 2S gallons 

 of milk produce 24 lbs. of cheese, which presu- 

 ming, as he does, that each cow gives a thousand 

 gallons in the year, would give 857 lbs. of cheese, J 

 and Mr. Ratston, another eminent Scotch dairy- 

 man, quoted by Mr. Aiton, says ''that he would 

 not keep a cow on his farm that did not yield her 

 own value, or her weight, in sweet-milk cheese 

 every year." 



The average product of full-milk cheese in the 

 best English dairies, where the whole milk and 

 cream are used, cannot, however, be estimated at 

 more than four cwt. In Leicestershire, indeed, 

 and on other deep grazing soils, that carry heavy 

 stock, a well managed cow is reckoned to make 

 from three to five hundred, long weight of 120 

 lbs,,§ besides supporting her calf until it can be 

 weaned; but such cows require full three acres of 

 the best meadow, lor summer and winter keep, 

 and it is not in the power of every farmer, if he 

 even have the stock, to procure such land to main- 

 tain them. In Somersetshire, the average is four 

 cwt. and ahalf;|| in Essex, not so high;1l and 

 Mr. Marshall states that of all the midland coun- 

 ties at something more than three cwt.** 



* Essex Agricultural Survey, Vol. II. p. 289. 



J Dairy Husbandry, p. 53. It is much to be regret- 

 ted that Scotch writers on husbandry do not take the 

 trouble to reduce their provincial weights into the 

 common standard. Three different ones are in use, 

 and unless they are distinctly specified, much confu- 

 sion is occasioned in calculations: Mr. Aiton's words 

 are "fifty-five pints (Scotch) will produce one stone 

 (county weight) of full milk cheese." Now the above 

 calculation is grounded on the Scotch pint containing 

 two English quarts, and the Ayrshire stone 16 lbs. of 24 

 oz. but in some places the pound consists of only 

 twenty-two ounces and a half. 



§ Leicester Agricultural Survey, pp. 154 and 227. 

 Cheshire do. p. 271. 



|| Somerset Agricultural Survey, 3d Edit. p. 251. 

 IT Essex Agricultural Survey, Vol. II. p. 271. 



**Rural Economy of the Midland Counties, 2d Edit. 

 Vol. I. p. 326. 



