1889 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
379 
the people. This supply was diminished be¬ 
cause fattening cattle did not attain the size 
and weight they ought to have done, by a good 
deal, and it was not made up from American, 
Canadian and foreign European sources. 
The price of beef increased a little in the 
autumn of that year, instead of diminishing 
as is usually the case ; and this increase in 
value of beef, coupled with a very short sup¬ 
ply of grass and roots, cause 1 a large number 
of cattle to be sold to the butchers, which 
Fig 143. 
would otherwise have been wintered. As it 
was, however, many districts had difficulty in 
wintering their remaining cattle, and hay 
went up to $30 and $35 per ton, and straw up 
to $25, in the spring of last year. I have 
never known cattle so low in price as they 
were in the fall of 1887, and though they did 
not improve in value in the following spring 
as much as might have been expected, still 
they paid very well for the wintering, to those 
who had forage enough of their own without 
buying. The summer of 1888 was a wet 
one, and crops were abundant, while cattle 
were much diminished in number, so that in 
the fall of 1888 bovine stock were worth 60 or 
70 per cent, more than they were a year ear¬ 
lier. 
During the last winter, cattle have not paid 
for wiuteriug, save cows in milk. All other 
sorts of store stock have for the most part 
been wintered at a loss, although they are now 
worth $15 to $20 more than they were this 
time last year; and this illustrates the great 
increase of value which took place between 
the spriug and fall of last year, and the still 
greater increase between last fall and the one 
before it. Calving cows are now worth up to 
or over $100 each for good specimens; they 
may, in fact, be said to run from $70 to $100, 
in round figures. Barren two-year-olds are 
worth $40 to $60, yearlings from $30 to $40, 
and heifers and cows $60 to $80. Sheep have 
advanced correspondingly in value, for year¬ 
lings are worth $S to $11 each, and mutton 16 
to 20 cents per pound, while the top price of 
beef remains at about 16 cents. 
Here we are, then, with a greatly dimin¬ 
ished stock of cattle and sheep, and higher 
prices corresponding thereto, or resulting 
from it, 1 should say. A great deal of forage 
is left over from last winter, and wo are hav¬ 
ing an early, grassy spring. The milk trade, 
owing to scarcity of cows, has improved, and 
stock-raising promises to pay well for at least 
two or three years to come. Cheese is worth 
eight to 12 cents, and butter 20 to 24 cents per 
pound, with good promise of an increase at all 
events in cheese. It will therefore be perceived 
that our dairy farmers 1 prospects are a good 
deal more cheerful than they have been for 
many a long year of weary depression. Sheep 
farmers, too. have reason to be more hopeful, 
though wool remains, and is likely to remain, 
low in value. Our arable farmers, unfortu¬ 
nately, have no such reasons for jubilation, 
and are not at all likely to have, I fear ; and 
so it is that more land is each year being laid 
down to permanent grass ; and the soil of Old 
England is going more and more out of culti¬ 
vation, out of deference to the great grain- 
raising regions of the Hew World on your side 
of the Atlantic. 
We are slowly emerging from the period of 
depression whicn set in 10 years ago in real 
earnest, but it cannot be doubted that British 
agriculture has received a check which will 
not be wiped out, probably, in this century. 
The trade of the country is again improving, 
manufacturers are busy, new mills and work¬ 
shops are being put up in hundreds, and pop¬ 
ulation is increasing rapidly, and we have no 
virgin soils, as you have, to feed our people 
from. So long as our commerce continues to 
expand the old ship will float on bravely 
enough ; and it may help us somewhat if the 
foolish nations on the Continent fly at each 
others’ throats again, as they most probably 
will before long—and we keep out of the rum¬ 
pus. All the same, however, we may well 
envy you, far removed as you are from the 
feuds and hatreds of race and country in Eu¬ 
rope. Fortunately for us, we are removed 
from them by a silver sti ip of sea, narrow 
though it be ; but you are removed by the 
wide Atlantic, and may pursue your magnifi¬ 
cent development in peace and absolute se¬ 
curity. To farm in England is better than to 
farm on the Continent of Europe, but not so 
good as to farm in America, so far as pros¬ 
pects are concerned. 
Surrey, England. 
UTILIZING THE STRIPPINGS. 
L. S. HARDIN. 
The old Kentucky method of saving the 
strippings; city milk suppliers make butter 
of them ; strippings the richest part of 
each milking ; the reason for this ; com¬ 
parative richness of the morning's and 
night's milk ; discussion on the matter, 
I am asked to tell readers of the Rural 
what I know about “ strippings,” and how 
they are treated by those who supply city 
milk routes. My earliest recollections of 
farm life recall the practice of our Kentucky 
negro “ mammas,” who did the milking and 
always carried a large quart cup to the cow- 
3 ’ard. Their practice was to draw about 
three-fourths of the milk into the large cedar 
bucket and then finish the milking into the 
tin cup which was emptied into a pail reserv¬ 
ed for this purpose. These strippings were 
poured directly into the cream jar, while the 
other part of the m lk was set for the cream 
to rise in old-fashioned glazed crocks. 
This method of saving the last and richest 
portion of the milk for butter-making is still 
practiced as a general thing Dy milkmen -who 
supply town routes. There is, however, an 
exception to this rule and it comes about in 
this way. Every milkman makes his con¬ 
tracts for delivering milk nearly up to the 
maximum supply of his herd, always leaving 
Fig. 144. 
a margin for meeting an extra demaud for 
milk. When this demand arises he of course 
puts in the strippings, and, if his conscience 
is not too tender, a little water to keep the 
milk from beiug too rich. When this extra 
demand falls otT he reserves the strippings 
once more and makes butter of them, at the 
same time selling the buttermilk. It is of 
course impossible to keep the supply of milk 
and the demand of the customers exactly in 
the same proportion, so that there must always 
be a margin of extra supplv to meet emergen¬ 
cies, and this extra milk must be turned to 
profitable use, and no better method has been 
found than to make butter of it. This can 
best be done by holding back the strippings, 
even though doing so lowers the quality of the 
milk supply, which does not usually trouble 
the milkman very much. The extra demand 
usually comes in hot weather, when bar-rooms 
and babies take an extra supply along with 
berries and ice-cream. At that time there is 
apt to be dry weather that injures the pas¬ 
tures and produces flies, fall of which tend 
to cut short the milk supply. 
There has been a good deal of scientific dis¬ 
cussion of late years as to whether the milk 
drawn in the morning or that drawn at 
night is the richer and the whys and 
wherefores of it, but I believe there is no dis¬ 
pute about the fact that the last part of the 
milk drawn from the udder is much richer 
than the first part. The old theory was that 
the cow had already created the milk and 
held it in completed form in the udder and 
that the richest part being the lightest, kept 
at the top of the udder, while the watery 
part being the heaviest, descended to the teats 
and was, of course, the first to be drawn by 
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the milker. This fact that the richest milk 
comes last is a severe stumbling-block in the 
way of the new theory that the bulk of the 
milk is created by the cow during the act of 
milking. How this fact can be reconciled 
with the new th ery I do not see. 
To go back to nature: we know that the 
cow’s milk is intended for the support 
of the calf; that while the calf is very 
young it needs milk comparatively poor 
in butter fats, and as it grows older 
it needs more fat. To meet this demand 
we find that the milk of all cows grows 
comparatively richer as they progress from 
the time of parturition. These two condi¬ 
tions seem to meet the exact requirements of 
nature; but why the last of each individual 
milking should be richer than the first part is 
still unaccounted for. It may be that nature 
reserves the creamy portion for the finishing 
part of the calf’s meal as a sort ot dessert to 
quicken the appetite and induce it to suck the 
cow dry for her benefit, which is certainly a 
good thing for her. 
If my recollection serves me aright, all well 
authenticated experiments prove that the 
morning’s milkings are always not only the 
largest but the richest, a circumstance that 
goes to prove that the night’s rest is conduc¬ 
ive not only to the production of a greater 
quantity but of a richer quality of milk. 
VVe know that exercise of the cow tends to les¬ 
sen the supply of butter fats in the milk. Even 
the swinging and kicking ot the lower part of 
the udder as the cow walks, may have con¬ 
siderable effect m lessening the amount of 
butter fats in that part of the udder. 
This, of course, is only guess-work, but it is 
the best one can do until science definitely 
settles the question. I have known cows that 
gave almost pure water from the teats at first, 
while the last milk drawn would form clots 
of butter on the sides of the paiL It looks 
very much as though gravitation had more to 
do with this than anything else. The fact re¬ 
mains,however, whatever the theory may say, 
and is within the knowledge of every dairy¬ 
man that the last half of the milk drawn con¬ 
tains at least two-thirds of the butter fats of 
that special milKing, and all dairymen have 
long since learned that if any portion of the 
milk is to be retained for butter-making the 
last third is the part for them to hang on to. 
This is usually done in town dairies by the 
milker first taking two-thirds or three- 
fourths, as the case may demand, of the milk 
from four or five cows, emptying the bucket 
into the wagon can and then returning and 
milking those cows dry, and pouring that milk 
into the can that stays at home. This cus¬ 
tom may not reach a very high plane of 
morals, but it is strictly business. 
KEEPING A MILK RECORD. 
I herewith send the Rural some sketches 
of a device (see Fig, 143) in use at the Univer¬ 
sity barns for keeping records of the milk of 
individual cows. The idea was obtained from 
a similar device illustrated in a bulletin from 
the Minnesota Experiment Station, and used 
for recording the data of feeding experiments. 
It consists of a box a little wider than the 
paper to be used, in which are two rollers 
about the size of curtain rollers, shown in sec¬ 
tion in Fig. 1. The paper used is ruled both 
ways, and is fastened to the rollers by a long 
stick which tits into a groove cut in the roller, 
as shown in Fig. 3. Between the rollers the 
paper passes up and over a narrow board or 
stick, where only a very narrow strip of it i 3 
exposed. Two lines are used for each day’s 
record: one for the morning and one for 
the evening milking. Fig. 4 shows a way of 
hanging the device against the wall where a 
table is not used; when not in use it is let 
down against the wall. j. m. d. 
Cornell University. 
(Tl)c^Poultnj )) art). 
PLAN FOR POULTRY HOUSE. 
The poultry house shown at Fig. 145, is ar¬ 
ranged for two breeds. It is 20 feet long, six 
feet wide and 7% feet high. The lower end 
of the roof is 2!^ feet from the ground. The 
house faces the south, and the interior is lined 
throughout with tar-paper to make it warm 
and keep it free from insects. It contains a 
hall with a room on each side. Each room is 
lighted by a window 28x24 inches, three feet 
from the ground. The roosts are even with 
the windows, and the drop-boards are eight 
inches below. The nests are below the drop- 
boards, and can be easily reached from the 
hall by simply turning a wooden button and 
letting down a door which extends the whole 
length of the partition, as seen beneath. 
The hall is three feet wide and six feet 
long, and contains two small ventilators, 
one above the door and the other 
at the opposite end of the hall. The par¬ 
titions that inclose the hall extend almost 
as high as the door, and are so constructed 
that they can be readily removed. This 
plan is very simple, and the house is easily 
constructed, and combines all of the con¬ 
veniences possible in so small a space, c. R. 
Richmond, Indiana. 
A DAKOTA POULTRY HOUSE. 
Mr. C. W. Faber, of Potter County, Dako¬ 
ta, ha3 a house for his hens like that shown at 
Fig. 144. A shows the shape of the house and 
the small window in the roof. B shows the 
interior; a a a are nests; c c c are roosts and 
b is a water fountain. C is a door also shown 
at the toD of the cut. This house can be made 
of any desired size; Mr. F.'s house is six by 
eight by nine feet. This, he thinks, is amply 
large enough for 15 to 20 Black Spanish hens. 
professor a. j. cook. 
Defence of the hay tedder; instance of its 
advantage; in favor of the hay loader ; 
how it is used. 
I was much surprised to read the article by 
Prof. I. P. Roberts in a late Rural New- 
Fig. 146. 
Yorker. His opinion cuts so directly athwart 
my experience and the opinion of some of 
our best Michigan farmers, that I cannot well 
understand it. No one can doubt Prof. 
Roberts’s ability or candor, and the only pos¬ 
sible explanation I can offer is that he either 
had poor machinery, or else the latter was run 
by incompetent men. The latter suggestion 
could not apply to Prof. Roberts, as he is a 
most cautious person and a natural me¬ 
chanic. 
1. “ Hay tedders are too expensive for most 
farmers, considering their liability to get out 
of repair and the little time they are in use. 
Then, too, unless they are used with the ut¬ 
most judgment, they seriously injure the 
quality of the hay.” 
In reply, let me say that I value the tedder 
very highly. I have used mine now for sev¬ 
eral years and it is still in excellent condition, 
