Thirty-fourth Annual Convention. ^^^ 



know the cost of production for it is the net profit which makes 

 a cow valuable. 



He must put into operation on his farm a system which 

 will enable him to know these three factors about every cow in 

 the herd. I know of no system which will do this as cheaply and 

 as efficiently as a co-operative cow testing association. Of these 

 they have a number in the old country, Denmark has over four 

 hundred, Sweden about five hundred, and Norway about 180 

 and Germany and Finland have a number. I will explain first 

 the practical workings of the association. 



A few farmers in their community owning a sufficient number 

 of cows organize themselves into an association, elect officers and 

 hire a man to do the testing. The expense is to be paid pro-rata 

 by each man in proportion to the number of cows he owns. It 

 is desirable to have sufficient number of cows in the association 

 so that the expense will not exceed $1.00 to $1.50 per cow a 

 year. This man visits one herd a day. He arrives in the after- 

 noon, sees the cow's milk and takes a sample from it for testing, 

 estimates the feed and the cost and puts all this data down on a 

 record blank, which he leaves with the farmer. This perfor- 

 mance he repeats the next morning and that day the farmer takes 

 him and his outfit to the next farmer, and so on. He gets to 

 each farm once a month and at the end of the year he figures up 

 the yield of milk and butter fat, the value of the same, the cost 

 of feed to maintain each cow a year; figures out the profit or loss 

 on each individual in the herd and furnishes every patron with a 

 complete record. And all this at an expense of from $1.00 to 

 $1.50 per cow a year. 



We can put it this way. Suppose a man comes to your farm 

 today and says that for $1.00 per cow he will tell jom just exact- 

 ly how many pounds of milk each cow gives, how much butter 

 fat she gives, what it costs to keep her and what the net profit is 

 from each cow per year. Wouldn't you think it a business 

 proposition to accept this offer, and that is just what a co-opera- 

 tive cow testing association offers to every man. 



There is another factor in this system, which we should not 

 lose sight of. We know that this man comes to our farm once 

 a month and looks over our business, and it is natural for us to 

 want this business to give as good an impression as possible, and 

 we are going to show a little more interest in our own business, 



