66 FARM MANAGEMENT 



enterprise more than paid the loss on butter. Milk 

 sold to creameries to be made into butter paid better, 

 but required extra good production peT cow to pay. 1 In 

 Connecticut, with an extra good herd of cows, the average 

 cost of producing butter for five years (1906-1911) was 

 38 cents per pound. 2 The average farm price of butter 

 for the two years 1910 and 1911 was 33 cents. At this 

 price, there was an average loss of $16 per cow per 

 year. 



Market milk must be produced near the consumer, be- 

 cause it is both perishable and bulky for its value. But 

 it is not free from competition. Within the range of pos- 

 sible shipment of any of our cities, there are very many 

 more cows than are required to produce the necessary 

 milk. Whenever cheese or butter prices drop, there is a 

 tendency for farmers who are farther from the railroad to 

 sell milk instead of making butter. Along every railroad 

 that hauls milk, there is a strip of land from which all the 

 product is sold as milk, but a little farther back from the 

 railroad, it does not pay to haul milk, so that butter or. 

 cheese are made. Milk trains can readily be put on more 

 roads, or extend farther from the cities if necessary. 

 Some regions have a milk train in winter, but none in 

 summer. There is an immense reserve of milk that can 

 be used for butter or cheese when milk is low, but that can 

 be sold as milk whenever prices warrant. 



61. Transportation and egg-production. It is so 

 difficult to get eggs to the consumer in good condition 

 that the farmer near the market has the advantage. A 

 dozen eggs will buy 16 pounds of wheat in New York, but 

 will buy only 13 pounds in Iowa. The chief chicken food 



1 New York, Cornell Bulletin 295, p. 483. 

 * Connecticut, Storrs Bulletin 73. 



