258 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
April 9 
THE CARE OF THE CAN. 
HANDLE IT WITH CARE. 
HE proper care of this utensil is 
too often neglected, and many 
times, it is responsible for sour milk 
and bad flavors. The dairyman should 
be careful, in purchasing, to get a can 
that is strong and durable, because it 
is bound to be knocked and tumbled 
about, especially if used for shipping. 
A can that will not stand rough treat¬ 
ment is short-lived, and the money in¬ 
vested in it will be a dead loss. While 
the first cost is greater, the best is 
none too good, and will prove the most 
economical in the end. The best can is made of a 
single sheet of heavy, tough wrought steel, heavily 
tinned and protected by strong iron hoops. There 
should be no cracks to rust or clean. Noiseless handles 
made to fit the hand are desirable. The size of the 
can to be used will depend upon the conditions of the 
dairyman: for shipping, one holding 40 or 45 quarts 
is generally preferred. 
Following the motto, “Handle with Care”, is the 
secret of preserving a can ; every dent brings it so 
much nearer to the rubbish heap. Keep the can housed 
when not in use, to prevent rusting. Exposure to sun¬ 
shine, however, will do no harm, and is bene 
ficial from the sanitary standpoint. Cans 
not properly cleaned are often accountable 
for sour, filthy milk. Experiments have 
shown that milk stored in sterilized cans 
will keep nearly twice as long as when kept 
in cans washed in the ordinary way. To 
clean a can thoroughly (free it from germs) 
it must, first, be scrubbed, then scalded out 
with boiling water, care being taken that it 
is boiling, or better still, use live steam under 
pressure. No living organism can with¬ 
stand steam, not even bacterial spores, al¬ 
though some of them will resist a tempera¬ 
ture of 200 degrees F. In dairy houses 
supplied with a boiler, it can easily be man¬ 
aged to turn cans over a jet of steam having 
a pressure of 15 or 20 pounds. After steam¬ 
ing, cans should be kept bottomside up, as 
bacteria tend to go downward. There are 
patent “ milk-ean washers” on the market 
which run by power, but for the ordinary 
dairyman, hand brushes will be found ju$t as 
effectual and more economical. 
Cans worn so that the interior rusts or 
shows cracks and crevices, should be repaired 
or discarded, the latter being the better 
plan, as a rule. One small crack, which may 
not be noticed, unless closely examined, 
may contain bacteria enough to inoculate the 
whole can and start the milk well on its way 
to souring, and the production of bad flavors. 
The rapidity with which bacteria multiply 
is astonishing. Biologists tell us that one 
bacterium may multiply a thousandfold in 
six hours under favorable conditions, hence 
the importance of thorough cleansing. When 
milk sours in an unusually short time, 
especially in Summer, the cause may be 
found in the can which contains it. 
While the farmer does not need to be a 
“jack of all trades”, there are many small 
jobs of repairing which he can do himself, and 
save considerable expense. With a little ex¬ 
perience and a soldering equipment, which 
need not cost more than 50 cents, he can 
mend all his cans, pails and tinware, instead 
Q f paying the tinner to do it. What has 
been said concerning the care of the can, will also 
apply to other dairy utensils. The dairyman needs 
to be constantly at war with bacteria. Victory 
means pure milk and good prices. c. b. lane. 
New .Jersey Experiment Station. 
held, that a space of cream from one herd was of equal 
value with that from another, has met its deathblow. 
In Connecticut, more than two-thirds of our 60 cream¬ 
eries are now paying according to the pounds of but¬ 
ter fat furnished, although it is but five years since 
the first creamery ventured to make the change. The 
question is sometimes asked, “ Is the Babcock test 
thoroughly reliable?” Many carefully conducted trials 
have been made to compare this method of fat deter¬ 
mination with the older and slower methods of chem¬ 
ical analysis, and all agree that the Babcock test is a 
simple and accurate method for fat determination. 
Practically the only weakness in the system for uSe 
in creameries is the difficulty met in securing accurate 
samples. This drawback is less noticeable in milk¬ 
receiving than in cream-gathering creameries. Milk 
may be made uniform by mixing, much more readily 
than cream. Slight errors in analysis count for less 
in the final results with milk which has a compara¬ 
tively low per cent of fat, as compared with cream 
with a high per cent of fat. 
The Babcock test has been advocated by some writers 
as a reliable guide for judging of the value of a cow 
as a butter producer. The advice has sometimes been 
given, when a farmer is about to purchase, “ Take 
along a Babcock test, and the percentage of fat in the 
milk will afford a safe means of judging of the value 
of the cow.” Right here is where the limitations of 
store up a large part in their own frames. The feed¬ 
ing capacity of individuals becomes an important fac¬ 
tor in judging of their value. By this, I mean the 
ability to turn their food to the best account without 
loss of energy. The efficiency of a machine is not only 
judged by the quantity and quality of the work 
turned out, but by the waste of energy of the fuel 
consumed. So with our great milk-producing machine ; 
its value must be judged, not only by the product, 
but by the loss of the energy of the food. This will 
strikingly affect the final profits, and is something 
that the Babcock test cannot detect. The value of 
our farm live stock must be judged largely by the test 
of close observation, something which experience only 
can give. c. s. piielps. 
Storrs (Conn.) Experiment Station. 
SOME LIMITATIONS OF THE BABCOCK TEST. 
One of the greatest aids that has come to the Amer¬ 
ican dairyman is the Babcock test for the determina¬ 
tion of fat in milk and cream. To the creamery pa¬ 
tron, its benefits have been most striking. Where 
less than 10 years ago, the milk brought to our cream¬ 
eries was all “ pooled,” to-day each patron is paid 
according to the butter value of his product. This 
system of payment has checked fraud, and greatly 
encouraged the breeding and raising of better stock. 
Through the use of this test, the creamery manager 
has been able to check the efficiency of his butter- 
maker, by studying the losses in the skim-milk and 
buttermilk. 
The space system of payment for cream, which had 
so firm a foothold in the East, has likewise been 
mainly supplanted. The old claim, so tenaciously 
A QUART OF AVERAGE MILK; WHAT IT CONTAINS. Fig. 110. 
This quart weighs 2.2 pounds, and contains 87 per cent of water, 3*4 of fat. 
3*4 of casein, 5 of milk sugar, and 1 of ash. 
the Babcock test are most apparent. The same cow 
will often vary from one day to the next, in the per 
cent of fat in her milk, as much as one-half to one per 
cent. The fat content of a cow’s milk can be accu¬ 
rately measured only by oft-repeated tests, or by tak¬ 
ing a small sample from several milkings. Even then, 
we are at a loss in forming an accurate judgment, un¬ 
less we also know the milk yield. Here again, we 
may be misled, unless a full year's record of the milk 
yield is at hand. Many cows are very productive for 
a few months after calving, but decrease in milk flow 
rapidly as the period of lactation advances. Others 
are never heavy producers as judged by the daily flow, 
but are persistent milkers that will “ hold out” for a 
long time, and often go dry but a few weeks. The 
yearly milk record with fat tests about once a month, 
made from a mixed sample of several days’ collec¬ 
tion, is essential in judging of the real productiveness 
of a cow. 
But even when the true yearly product is obtained, 
we have not the whole story. Cows vary greatly in 
their ability to turn the crude materials of the food 
into milk and butter. While some seem to turn all of 
the energy of the food into the milk pail, many more 
BEST METHODS OF KEEPING MILK FOR 
THE LONGEST TIME. 
Realizing that perfectly sterile milk has been ob¬ 
tained from the cow under extreme precautions by 
scientists at various times, and that the product ob¬ 
tained will remain sweet indefinitely when kept 
from external contamination, we are forced to realize 
that the best practiced methods must, in some way, 
approach those used by our scientific friends, of which 
the extreme precautions relate mainly to cleanliness 
in the minutest details. So our first con¬ 
sideration must be cleanliness in the produc¬ 
tion of the milk, to keep the cows clean ; 
their environment, and most particularly 
the milker, must be clean—not only decent 
looking, but his hands should be as clean as 
possible. Extreme cleanliness throughout 
will do more towards keeping the milk sweet 
than any subsequent manipulations. 
It has often been claimed that the use 
of certain aerators will keep milk sweet, and 
they certainly are of great assistance in the 
average dairy, though 1 have reason to believe 
that, if all the other precautions are taken, 
simple aeration has no particular virtue. One 
of the most important features to be ob¬ 
served is the immediate cooling of the milk, 
and to this end, the 1 various coolers are very 
helpful, and do much towards facilitating 
this process. 
Great care must at all times be observed 
in having everything with which the milk 
comes in contact, as clean as possible, and 
sterilized whenever it can be so arranged. 
The immediate reduction of the temperature 
from the animal heat to a temperature of 
about 48 degrees F., anil all facilities for 
this reduction which are used will, in the 
end, prove very satisfactory. The maintain¬ 
ing of a uniformly low temperature, avoid¬ 
ing all possible changes, will do much 
towards increasing the keeping qualities, 
even more so than the reduction to an ex¬ 
tremely low temperature at first with subse¬ 
quent rises, and though these variations may 
be under the limit of 55 degrees F., it is 
better to keep the milk uniformly at 50 de¬ 
grees F. than to reduce it to 45 degrees F., 
allow it to warm up to 50 degrees F., reduce 
it to 48 degrees F. again, and similar varia¬ 
tions. • The more thoroughly the cream is 
kept mixed with the milk, the longer the 
entire mass will keep sweet, as the cream is 
the first portion of the milk to start souring. 
Mr. Harrison, Superintendent of the 
Walker-Gordon Laboratory, has had con¬ 
siderable experience in preparing milk for 
European travelers, and the methods he 
has found most satisfactory in the preservation of 
the milk products have been about as follows: The 
bottles and eveiytliing with which the milk is to come 
in contact, are carefully sterilized (212 degrees F. for 
40 minutes); then he sees that the milk is fresh and 
sweet, being careful to keep it thoroughly mixed. 
The milk is poured into the bottles, leaving some air 
space ; the bottles are then stoppled with non-absorb¬ 
ent cotton, this being done very carefully so that no 
air may pass in either direction. Thereupon, the 
whole package is sterilized (212 degrees F. for 40 min¬ 
utes). Then the milk is allowed to cool, and sub¬ 
sequently is put in cold water. After several hours, 
it is taken out and allowed to get warm; thereupon 
it is again sterilized and subsequently cooled and 
iced. The milk is always carefully agitated before 
being placed in the sterilizer. 
After sterilized milk has stood in cold storage for 
some time, the cream i*ises and becomes hard ; in 
order to leave the fat evenly distributed through the 
milk again, it is advisable to warm the milk to 98 de¬ 
grees F. by immersion in hot water, and then gently 
to agitate it. This will insure a good emulsion. Milk 
treated in this way has been sent to Cairo, Egypt, and 
has given perfect satisfaction, e. nelson ehriiart. 
Dairy Expert, New York City. 
