194 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



ury. The consideration of this topic is important, from the fact 

 that a much less quantity is produced than might be, with the 

 same outlay of capital and labor ; and still more important from 

 the sad fact that much of it is so poorly manufactured. It is 

 estimated that more than a million of dollars is annually lost to 

 the producer and consumer from poor butter. 



Let us hint at some of these great leaks in this branch of 

 dairy farming. First, the character of our milch cows, their 

 feed and their treatment. 



The cow from whose milk we wish to manufacture butter, 

 should not only yield a fair amount of milk, but this milk 

 should be rich in the amount of constituent elements needful to 

 make butter, abundant in quantity, yellow in color, firm, well- 

 grained in texture, and " nutty " in flavor. Every dairyman 

 knows that cows vary in the above particulars. It should be 

 the earnest endeavor of the butter dairymen to obtain cows that 

 are known to have descended from a " butter family," to rear 

 their progeny, and thus improve the butter-making herd in this 

 county. 



The feed of the cow should be in abundance, and contain all 

 the constituent elements that enter into the composition of milk 

 rich in butter properties. The cow is only a vitalized manufac- 

 tory to change the elements of grasses, roots and cereals into 

 milk appropriate to the uses of man. The cow can no more 

 secrete milk suitable for good butter-making without appropriate 

 feed, than the Israelites in Egypt could make brick without 

 straw. The cow, in summer and autumn, should feed on the 

 succulent grasses, as clover and timothy, and not on white-weed, 

 thistles and brakes. To improve the manufacture of butter in 

 our county, we must improve our pastures ; cut down and ut- 

 terly eradicate bushes, hardbacks and other noxious weeds, 

 apply compost, ashes, salt and lime, also gypsum or plaster of 

 Paris, and the green grass will wave, and the white clover will 

 dot our hillsides. 



The milch cow should have hay in winter not overdried, and 

 the grass for the hay should be cut when in blossom or the seed 

 soft and doughy. The quality of the grass should be improved 

 by fertilizers. It is economy, nay, capital, to get out the rocks 

 and use the modern agricultural implements in cutting, curing 



