72 ILLINOIS STATE DAIRYMEN'S ASSOCIATION 



is given a mineral mixture including those various ingre- 

 dients, and we might as well appreciate that fact. So far 

 as ingredients such as sulphur, charcoal, copperas, etc., are 

 concerned, some of them are mild medicines. Epsom salts 

 are good laxatives, and all right if a cow needs a laxative, 

 but in general I do not believe in patent medicines and in 

 cure-alls. If an animal is healthy you do not need to pat- 

 ronize remedies of one kind or another. Get good advice 

 about staying healthy, but I don't believe in doping a 

 healthy animal with miscellaneous remedies. 



Many of the commercial mixtures are intelligently 

 made, but we have got to appreciate this basic fact: there 

 is no evidence that a cow will be any better off by giving 

 her a mixture of things than she will be by following the 

 simple recommendations I have made. These commercial 

 mineral mixtures cost all the way from sixty to seventy 

 up to one hundred and fifty to one hundred and seventy 

 dollars a ton. The question for any farmer to ask himself 

 is this: does he have to spend his hard-earned cash in pay- 

 ing high prices for a mineral mixture when he can supply 

 the mineral needs of his dairy cows by following these 

 simple recommendations? 



I have sheets here which give these recommendations. 

 All the essential facts are on the two sides of that sheet, 

 and so far as we know cows will produce just as much and 

 be just as thrifty as if they received a very complicated 

 mineral mixture. 



The same statement can be made with reference to 

 preparations, one of which is manufactured and sold ex- 

 tensively in your state, a combination of yeast and min- 

 erals. So far as I know, that will produce profit for the 

 manufacturer but not for you. Furthermore, a statement 

 is often made that mineral mixtures will prevent or cure 

 contagious abortion. I am sorry to have to say that there 

 is no scientific proof of those assertions. The type of abor- 

 tion that has been produced in these Wisconsin experi- 

 ments that I mentioned, is not contagious abortion. The 

 herd was also tested by the abortion tests. It was nutri- 

 tional abortion produced by a lack of lime. As far as I 



