CHAPTER XV 



THE CONTROL OF THE MILK SUPPLY: (3) BY THE TRADE 



General Note ; (i) Milk Herds: — Freedom from Disease, Inspection, Bacterio- 

 logical Examination, Tuberculin ; (2) The Housing of Milk Herds ; (3) 

 Milkers and Milking ; (4) Treatment of Milk after Milking : — Clean Milking, 

 Straining, Cooling, Transport ; (5) The Final Treatment of Milk : — Filtra- 

 tion, Preservation, Pasteurisation, Sterilisation ; the Retail Sale. Summary. 



Although much has been done by legislation, and doubtless much 

 more would be done if the present law were wisely but firmly 

 enforced, and although much has been done by several enterprising 

 milk companies and commissions, the real control of the milk trade 

 is largely in the hands of the public. The trade will supply what 

 the customer demands, provided the dairy farmer and the milk 

 purveyor know what to do and how to do it. Questions of price, 

 outlay, or compensation, have a tendency to right themselves in 

 the light of a well-informed public opinion and a rightly-cultivated 

 public taste. A pure milk supply, that is, a clean milk of good 

 quality ; from healthy cows ; properly strained and cooled, and pro- 

 tected from infection and contamination — which is the ideal we 

 have already suggested — could be obtained throughout the United 

 Kingdom in twelve months' time, if the public chose to insist that 

 should be so. 



The writer, therefore, proposes in this chapter to offer sugges- 

 tions by which the trade and the public can obtain such a satisfactory 

 milk supply. The term, " the trade " should be understood in the 

 broadest sense, 



1. Milk Herds 



It is probable that the chief pollution of milk gains access 

 in ways other than through the udder, and that few of the 

 common diseases conveyed by milk have a bovine origin. 

 Nevertheless the importance of healthy milch herds is beyond 

 question. To obtain milk from unhealthy cows is similar to 



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