40 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



Mr. PoTTEE. What is the average of your herd ? 



Mr. PiERroNT. Last year the average was 7,432 pouuds, 

 the highest giving 11,539 pounds and the lowest 5,340 

 pounds. In the thirteen years I have kept records the highest 

 cow average is 9,316 and the poorest 3,500 pounds. In the 

 one case there is a yearly profit of $G1, on the basis of my 

 figures, and in the other a yearly profit of G cents. 



The CirAiRMAN. The speaker has called attention to four 

 points, the man, the cow, the feed and the market. We can 

 buy the feed, and perhaps can get the market, if we eater 

 to it, though there seems to be very little market for milk at 

 the higher prices. Most of us are producing milk for a trade 

 that will not pay over 8 or 10 cents a quart, and many of us 

 are not getting enough to pay expenses. As much depends 

 on the market price as anything, although the cow and the 

 man are difficult to secure. The feed we can buy, if we have 

 the other necessities. 



Mr. Potter. I agree with most of what the lecturer has 

 said, but I wish to call a few of his statements in question. I 

 do not believe that we have been given the milk market for 

 New England producers. In fact, the Boston contractors 

 are now bringing in milk from northern l^ew York and from 

 Canada, and I am informed that cream is shipped in from 

 Prince Edward Island. Certified milk will keep two weeks 

 with icing, and sterilized milk two weeks without ice, so 

 that I see no reason why milk cannot be shipped into Boston 

 from a thousand miles away; and under our present freight 

 rates it will cost no more to ship it that distance than from 

 the Connecticut valley. The railroads do not always know 

 just what they are doing, any more than the farmers. At a 

 recent meeting the general counsel of the Boston & Maine 

 Railroad made the statement that they had been carrying 

 milk at a loss for thirty years. A witness before the Inter- 

 state Commerce Commission has recently stated that the 

 railroads of the country coidd save a million dollars a day 

 by the application of scientific principles. The lecturer asks 

 an impossibility when he asks ns to know just what it costs 

 to produce milk. ISTo two men in this audience would agree 

 as to the exact cost. I compiled some figures at one time 



