176 THE CREAMERY PATRON'S HANDBOOK. 



will succeed as a dairyman) will not be satisfied without owning a few pure- 

 bred and registered animals. 



THE BULL. In all cases the bull should be a pure-bred, and he should 

 be selected from a family of good milkers. Usually it is better to buy a 

 young bull, as one which has been raised on the place and has learned to know 

 his master is much more easily handled than is a mature animal when brought 

 to a strange place. When a good bull has been secured and has proved 

 his merit, he should be kept as long as possible. He should always have 

 kind and gentle treatment, but there should never be any question as to 

 who is master. A ring should be put into his nose by the time he is a year 

 old, and he should always be. led by a strap or staff snapped into this ring. 

 Whenever he is tied he should be fastened with a rope he cannot break, 

 and all fences should be so high and strong that he will never attempt to 

 go over or through them. When a young bull is handled properly he never 

 learns his strength, and so will be handled with comparative safety, but 

 success in a single unruly attempt will teach him a lesson he will never forget. 

 Many bulls live to old age without showing any unpleasant temper, but one 

 should never be trusted, as the older he becomes the greater is the liability 

 to a sudden vicious outbreak. 



It is much better for both the health and temper of the bull to give 

 him abundant exercise, either in a pasture or at work. When he can not 

 have a pasture to himself it is good economy to use his surplus energy in do- 

 ing useful work on a tread power. Such a power, of sufficient size to give 

 him all needed exercise, costs little, and it is much better to have him do 

 the churning, pumping, cutting hay and grinding feed than to have him 

 waste his time and strength tearing up the ground or attempting to get 

 out of his lot, or to become lazy and vicious standing in his stable. While 

 it is not often good practice to keep him in the pasture with the cows, he 

 should be kept in their sight as much as possible, and in the same stable 

 at night. 



WHEN cows SHOULD "COME FRESH". Whether cows should be bred to 

 drop their calves in the fall or in the spring depends largely on how the 

 marketing is to be done. Milk and butter usually bring better prices in 

 winter than in summer, and when such products are disposed of at whole- 

 sale it is better to have the larger supply when prices are highest, but when 

 one sells at retail to regular customers he must arrange to have his supply 

 nearly constant in order to hold his trade. 



A cow will give more milk and give it at a smaller cost when her calf 

 is dropped in the fall than when she is "fresh" in the spring. When a cow 

 "comes fresh" in the fall she is almost immediately put on her winter feed 

 and will continue to give a liberal supply of milk until the spring grazing 

 stimulates a renewed flow during the later months of her Jactation period. 

 Her dry period then comes in late summer, when prices are usually low, 

 when stabling is uncomfortable, and when the handling and care of the 

 milk is more troublesome than at any other time. Service in December 



