354 
FEEDING AND MANAGEMENT OF DAIRY COWS. 
By Charles S. Flint, 
Secretary of the Massachusetts State Board of Agriculture. 
No branch of dairy farming can compare in importance 
with the management of cows. The highest success will 
depend very much upon it, whatever breed be selected, and 
whatever amount of care and attention be given to the points 
of the animals; for experience will show that very little milk 
comes out of the udder that is not first put into the stomach. 
It is poor economy, therefore, to attempt to keep too many 
cows for the amount of feed we have ; for it will generally be 
found that one good cow, well bred and well fed, will yield as 
much as two ordinary cows kept in the ordinary way, while 
a saving is effected both in labour and room required, and in 
the risks on the capital invested. If the larger number on 
poorer feed is urged for the sake of the manure, which is 
the only ground on which it can be put, it is sufficient to 
remark that it is a very expensive way of making manure. 
It is not too much to say that a proper regard to profit and 
economy would require many an American farmer to sell off 
nearly half his cows, and to feed the whole of his hay and 
roots hitherto used into the remainder. 
A certain German farmer was visited, one day, by some 
Swiss from over the border, who desired to buy of him all 
the milk of his cows for the purpose of making cheese. 
Not being able to agree upon the terms, he finally proposed 
to let them take the entire charge of his cows, and agreed to 
furnish feed amply sufficient, the Swiss assuming the whole 
care of feeding it out, and paying a fixed price by measure 
for all the milk. “I found myself at once,” says he, “ under 
the necessity of selling almost half my cows, because the 
Swiss required nearly double the quantity of fodder which 
the cows had previously had, and I w ? as well satisfied that 
all the produce I could raise on my farm would be far from 
sufficient to feed in that way the number of cows I had kept. 
I was in despair at finding them using such a quantity of 
the best quality of food, though it was according to the 
strict letter of the contract, especially as I knew that I had 
given my cows rather more than the quantity of food recom¬ 
mended by men in whom I had perfect confidence. Thus, 
while Thacr names tw T enty-three pounds of hay, or its 
equivalent, as food sufficient for a good-sized cow, I gave 
mine full twenty-seven pounds. But if the change effected 
