188 MILK HYGIENE 



provisions, under which milk containing less than 2.8 

 per cent, fat can be sold only with a definite statement 

 of the fat content. 



It must depend upon local conditions whether such a 

 provision is desirable or not, and also whether it is re- 

 garded as wise to establish a minimum fat (and solid) 

 content, and at what point these should be placed. 



[Legal standards for milk are, by some, objected to 

 on two grounds ; first, that it is unfair to establish a mini- 

 mum standard so high that it will exclude the milk 

 from some cows, and, second, that if the standard is 

 low it will encourage dealers to dilute rich milk to a point 

 just above the standard. 



As to the first objection, it does not appear to be un- 

 reasonable that an article of food sold as milk shall be 

 required to contain a certain minimum amount of nutri- 

 ment. Entirely aside from the adulteration of milk, 

 which such standards are established to check, it is pos- 

 sible to select and develop herds of cows of certain 

 breeds that will furnish milk of very low fat and solids — 

 not fat content. What has occurred in this direction 

 is shown by reports on the weekly analyses of the milk 

 of a herd of cows at Jaschkowitz,*^ where the milk ran 

 down to 2.47 per cent, fats and 7.88 per cent, solids not 

 fat. The lowest average for the herd for a month was : 

 fat, 2.60 per cent.; solids not fat, 8.06 per cent.; total 

 solids, 10.66 per cent. The official records of Holstein 

 cows *^ show that many individuals yield milk contain- 

 ing less than 3.0 per cent, of fat, and some as little, for 

 a time at least, as 2.6 per cent. This tendency could, 

 undoubtedly, be intensified if the absence of milk stand- 



*' Berieht iiber die Tatigkeit des Milchwirtschaftlichen Instituts 

 zn Proskau f fir das Jahr 1905-1906. 



*° C. B. Lane, Kecord of Dairy Cows in the United States, U. S. 

 Dept. of Agr., B. A. I., Bulletin No. 75, Washington, 1905. 



