FORTY-SECOND ANNUAL CONVENTION 17 



The following table estimated from creamery returns will 

 show the averag-e production of each cow in the herd before any 

 individual records were kept : 



Year Av. lbs. milk per cow Av. lbs. fat per cow 



1900 3560 135 



1901 4648 176 



1902 4355 165 



1903 5054 190 



The cows in my herd during this period received only ordin- 

 Avy care, such as cows receive* on most farms in Stephenson 

 County. No attempt was made to. feed a balanced ration. 



Careful investigation by the Dair^^-Department of the Uni- 

 versity of Illinois on a large number of daiFy farms in Illinois, 

 show that cows producing from three to fotlr .thousand pounds 

 of milk just pay for the feed they consume and leave nothing 

 with which to pay labor, interest on money invested and rent 

 of barn. 



I was convinced that this was the case with my herd and 

 in December, 1903, began to apply the remedy to secure a more 

 profitable herd by weighing the milk and keeping a record of 

 the production of each individual cow in the herd. I also began 

 to study how to feed cows a balanced ration and provided better 

 care with the following results : 



Year Av. lbs. milk per cow Av. lbs. fat per cow 



1904 5800 224 



1905 7105 260 



1906 8057 307 



1907 8626 326 



1908 7984 307 



1909 8415 311 



1910 8309 289 



1911 9413 321 



1912 9090 301 



1913 8956 314 



You will notice that the average production of the herd was 

 increased in three years (1903-06) from five thousand pounds 

 milk and one hundred ninety pounds fat to eight thousand pounds 



