462 
DAIRY FARMING. 
have provided too limited a supply of food for a protracted 
winter, and are therefore forced to leave them out too long, 
and turn out in spring too early. Housing in time assists 
greatly to keep up the milk, and to continue it at the paying 
point well into the winter. It is obvious that when cows are 
turned out during cold wet nights in October they can little 
else but look for the best shelter the fences will afford, and 
there lie down ; and a very small allowance of food given 
inside, will be equal to what they can collect in the fields, even 
when the nights are moderately fine. In October butter is 
getting scarce and the price rising; therefore it pays to look 
to the comfort of the cattle, and feed fairly both in-doors and 
out, if it can at all be managed, which it can be, if the neces- 
sary measures have been taken. By this kind of treatment 
towards the close of the season, we come to the conclusion 
that as much money may be made extra as to convert what 
otherwise would have been but a middling season into an 
exceedingly prosperous one. In bringing cows through the 
winter it is of great benefit to their health to get a run out 
every day for a few hours, the exercise promotes circulation, 
prevents swollen joints, and tends to hardiness of con- 
stitution, besides improving the quality of their produce in 
the case of those which are milking. When dry the winter 
food of the in-calf cow may with great propriety consist of a 
morning and evening feed of roots (carefully avoiding frosted 
turnips) and as much oaten-straw as she will eat. This 
treatment regularly kept up will bring her to the calving in 
fine condition, enabling her to give milk in paying quantity, 
rich in quality, and therefore highly productive of butter. 
Although farmers holding rich land look upon turnip growing 
for dairy stock as an expensive process, and trust more to the 
large crops of hay they can grow than to roots; yet the 
upland farmer cannot in this way afford to imitate his more 
fortunate neighbour in doing so. Not being able to grow on 
light land more than half the crop of hay that the other can 
with perfect ease, the article becomes to him a most expensive 
one, and he must make green crop his main stay, the cha- 
racter of his soil giving him the opportunity of doing so, and 
rendering roots the most economical food he can raise. When 
calved, hay can be substituted for straw, and the quantity of 
roots increased to about 300 lbs. given in three feeds, a weight 
of roots quite sufficient for the heaviest cow. Some attention 
should be given in the commencement to avoid surfeit, as 
serious injury to the animal may be the result of over-feeding, 
and in any case, if the food should be rejected for a time, the 
produce is liable to suffer a very serious diminution. In 
