THIRTY-EIGHTH ANNUAL CONVENTION 87 



to be found two cows standing side by side under identically the 

 same conditions, consuming the same kinds of feed and the same 

 quantity, and one of these cows is making a handsome profit 

 and the other cow making an absolute loss. In some instances, 

 we have found one cow in a herd making as high as 400 pounds 

 of butter in a year, and another cow making as low as 100 pounds 

 of butter in a year, or even lower. It is just as plain as any- 

 thing can be that it makes no difference even though one of these 

 cows is eating, four times as much feed as the other, requiring 

 four times as much barn room as the other, and four times as 

 much time and care in feeding and milking her, still she is four 

 times as good a cow as the other and much better even than that. 

 With a very little figuring we can see that one cow in worth the 

 other four. So, I say we are not milking these cows that are los- 

 ing us money not because we want to, or because we don't know 

 any better, we are simply doing it because we have not yet brought 

 ourselves to realize the difference between a good cow and a poor 

 cow, and we never will until we begin keeping the records of the 

 cows. Then we go further than this, we not only milk these un- 

 profitable cows, but we save them, generation after generation, 

 save their offspring and we do not realize that the inherent value 

 of one calf that we are saving for a future dairy herd is far 

 greater than another, because we have not yet brought ourselves 

 to realize the immense value of records. We select our sires in 

 the same way, and even though we have raised some heifer 

 calves from some wonderfully good cows by mating these with 

 sires whose records we have disregarded and which would re- 

 duce them to the class of unprofitable cows by continuing this 

 practice, some of us have managed to stay just about where we 

 were twenty-five years ago and I presume 5,000 years ago. In 

 other words, we haven't got to a point where we wish to make a 

 change for the better. 



Which reminds me of what I noticed coming over in the 

 car. A lady stood by the car door for some time and finally she 

 said to a young man, "Will you kindly help me off this car?" He 

 said, "Certainly, I will be glad to." Then she explained to him, 

 she said, "You will notice I am very large and rather old, and 



