CH. XV CONDITIONS OF MILK SUPPLY 251 



to the writer are without water laid on to the sheds for the cows 

 to drink. The cows have to go outside to drink, and frequently 

 their only drinking water is obtainable from ponds, ditches, 

 and streams not uncommonly of very doubtful purity. That 

 a supply of water is also useful to wash down the sheds is a 

 fact very seldom recognised. 



Water for washing the milk vessels has to be provided, 

 and frequently is of good quality, but it is far from rare for 

 the only source to be derived from wells of very doubtful 

 purity, and sometimes of certain impurity. In illustration 

 the writer may mention two cases. In one the only water 

 supply available for the cows (a large herd of 50 cows or 

 more) and for washing the milk vessels was a small river 

 which, about 1^ mile higher up, had received the untreated 

 drainage of a large semi-urban district of about 1200 inhabitants. 

 In the other the cows drank from ditches in the fields, and 

 the only water supply for the milk vessels was from a shallow 

 well yielding water of unpleasant odour, which the farmer 

 admitted was so bad that none of the family ever used it 

 for drinking purposes. 



Porter ^ states : " Those of us who are in charge of rural 

 districts have to face the fact that a large number of farms 

 rely on wells which, on analysis, would be at once condemned 

 as unfit for drinking purposes, whilst many others would be 

 classed as being of doubtful purity." He notes that there 

 were about 100 dairy farms in his rural district (Eeigate 

 Eural), and that 44 relied partially or entirely on well water. 

 He examined bacteriologically samples from 34 of the water 

 supplies. Using very lenient bacteriological standards, 4 only 

 could be considered as pure, 1 8 were bad bacteriologically, and 

 12 doubtful. 



Richmond,^ as chemist to the Aylesbury Dairy Company, 

 gave particulars of 278 dairy farms, on which there were 

 altogether 447 water supplies; of these, 146 farms with a 

 total of 210 water supplies were passed, 86 farms with 113 

 water supplies were condemned and entirely rejected on this 

 account, while 46 farms were found at first to have altogether 

 75 polluted supplies, which were cut off, and a total of 49 



1 Public Health, 1909, xxii. p. 251. 

 2 Ibid. p. 254. 



