^o ^ A/rpv h oj^ 
NEW YORK, FEBRUARY 16, 1907 
Vol. LXVI. No. 2977 
WEEKLY. il.OO PEK YEAH 
■H 
If 
THE FAT IN COW’S MILK. 
Will Change of Feed Increase It? 
A discussion lias arisen among some dairymen here as to 
whether high graining of milch cows increases the quality 
of milk, or just the flow. In other words, if you take a 
milch cow from straw and put her on clover hay and chop 
feed, will the latter feed improve, the quality of milk? 
If it does, is it due to the improved physical condition, or 
does it really add flutter fat to the milk? a. g. l. 
Belleville, Ohio. 
This is the old question to the fore again. It lias 
been pretty well demonstrated that the kind of feed 
given a cow will not materially change the per cent 
of butter fat in her milk. This is a matter of breeding, 
not feeding. Had it been possible to feed fat into milk, 
the Holstein breeders would have long ago so fed their 
cows that they would now be producing milk as rich 
in fat as the Channel Island cattle. True, in several 
families they have raised it by breeding for that pur¬ 
pose. In the six months’ breed test at the Pan-Ameri¬ 
can Exposition, with 50 
different cows, where we 
knew exactly what each 
one ate, and each milk¬ 
ing was sampled to test 
for butter fat, we found 
no change in it worth 
mentioning due to feed. 
We did find that the fat 
would vary somewhat 
from day to day, usually 
dropping a little when the 
temperature was very high, 
or when unusually large 
crowds passed through the 
building. 
It has been thought, and 
is particularly true, that 
when a cow has become 
very poor, through im¬ 
proper and insufficient 
feeding, so that she has no 
surplus fat to draw on 
from her body, she will 
not give milk with the 
amount of fat in it she 
was bred to. The most 
exhaustive test of this 
kind we know of, was 
made by Prof. Wing of 
Cornell University, when 
he selected a herd of 20 
cows in the hands of a 
them sufficient or proper 
feed; cows very thin. He paid him to sample the 
milk for a year, and at regular intervals it was tested 
for butter fat. At the end of the year the herd was 
equally divided, and 10 of the cows purchased and 
taken to the College farm, and there fed—regardless of 
profit—all the corn and cotton-seed meal they would 
take with safety for another year. The cows gained 
in weight and nearly doubled in the amount of milk; 
but the average gain in per cent of fat was only about 
one-half of one per cent. 
As the liquids in the milk shrink as the cow advances 
in lactation, the solids remaining constant—the per cent, 
of fat increases. When a cow is fed wholly on straw, 
her flow will decrease and the per cent of fat. as well 
as other solids, will be greater. Again, when a cow is 
turned on soft watery pasture, and she is com¬ 
pelled to take into her system more water than 
she can naturally eliminate, she will “hydrate” some 
of it into her milk, and the per cent of fat, for the 
time being will decrease. 
I think the questioner touches an important point, 
when lie speaks of the “physical condition” of the milk. 
This, as well as the flavor can be materially changed 
by feed, and because the milk warms more readily and 
the cream is of better texture, many think they get 
more fat. I have run a creamery and bought milk on 
the test for a number of years, and never have found 
that the kind or amount of grain fed any dairy, changed 
the per cent of fat, although some of my patrons have 
striven to do so. 1 have noticed that a cow will often 
give a greater per cent of fat, for the first 10 days or 
two weeks after calving, than she will again, until she 
begins to decrease materially in her flow; also that a 
heifer will usually give a higher per cent of fat her 
first year in milk than ever after. 
EDWARD VAN ALSTYNE. 
SAN JOSE SCALE AND FRUIT CROWING. 
How It Changes Shape of Tree. 
The growing of apples on dwarf trees has been given 
some little attention at the New York State Experi¬ 
ment Station the past few years. It has also been a 
subject for discussion at the different horticultural meet¬ 
ings held in the State during that time. The New York 
Experiment Station has started small experimental or¬ 
chards in Columbia, Onondaga and Orleans Counties, 
where different varieties are being tested on standard, 
Doucin and Paradise stocks. The Doucin produces a 
small-growing tree, the Paradise not much more than 
a bush. These experiments have aroused no little 
interest among apple growers of the State, and many 
concede that a smaller growing tree would be desirable. 
Growers have tried various means of producing it with¬ 
out resorting to the use of a dwarfing stock. The re¬ 
sults that some growers have had in early bearing trees 
have been quite remarkable, and some are able to prove 
that paying crops can be produced on the so-called 
“dwarf grown standard” type of tree at five to 10 
years earlier than on the high-headed, carefully pruned 
apple orchard of the past. The Grant Hitchings sod 
culture orchard which T first saw six years ago is one 
example. The crop of fruit grown on trees from six 
to 12 years old of standard varieties would seem Tike 
fairy tales to most apple growers. W. T. Mann is 
attaining similar results in Niagara County by a dif¬ 
ferent system of culture, and the varieties like Ben 
Davis, R. I. Greening, Hubbardston, all of which, set 
less than 10 years, are producing profitable crops. Mr. 
Shons, of Orange County, also has an apple orchard 
bearing profitable crops at 10 years, under yet slightly 
different methods, and my attention is being repeatedly 
called to young orchards handled along slightly different 
lines, yet with like results. I was recently in an eight- 
'year-set orchard of Baldwin and King, the owner of 
which stated that individual trees of each variety had 
yielded one-half barrel of fruit the past season. 
Few of these growers agree upon the cause of this 
early fruitage. Various reasons are given by the dif¬ 
ferent growers; sod culture, grass mulch, cultivation, 
fertilization, soil, etc., but I have come to the conclusion 
that other factors being equal, early bearing of apple 
trees depends more upon the system of pruning or not 
pruning followed than upon any other factor. T have ob¬ 
served that practically all the early bearing of late 
bearing varieties has been upon trees pruned at time of 
setting, followed by prac¬ 
tically no pruning except 
the taking out of crossing 
branches. All observers 
of apple-tree growth know 
that the pruning and cutting 
back of trees in Winter or 
early Spring, as usually 
practised, is conducive to 
wood growth which is at 
the expense of fruit-bud 
production. A young 
growth not cut back ex¬ 
tends its growth from the 
terminal bud; the side 
buds produce fruit buds or 
spurs, upon which fruit 
buds are later formed. 
The growth of the termin¬ 
al bud after the first few 
years gradually shortens 
up; as the tree begins to 
bear the branches bend 
over, and as a result we 
have a small bearing tree 
similar to the apple tree 
of the Central West, where 
much the same let-alone 
style of pruning has been 
followed. 
The advantages of this 
style of tree are ease of 
spraying, important when 
we have 1 a pest like San 
Jose scale to fight; ease of 
harvesting crop; ease of thinning and removing im¬ 
perfect specimens if necessary to grow fancy fruit; 
fruit not so easily blown off by high winds, and if 
blown off but slightly injured. Very little likelihood 
of injury to trunk or large roots by plow or other 
tools. Disadvantages, said to be difficult of cultivation. 
Tree being smaller, yield will be less per acre; but by 
setting the smaller grown trees closer together, just as 
large a yield per acre will be attained. The time has 
come when every apple grower must expect to fight 
San Jose scale in the near future. Some of the most 
successful fruit growers who have had experience with 
this pest doubt if it will be held in check with profit 
on the old, high apple orchards. The enterprising are 
already planting young orchards to take the place of the 
old; some with the low-headed small tree in mind, 
others keeping to the old high-headed pruned-up model 
of there forefathers. New conditions must be met by 
new methods and ideas, and while I believe there has 
been no time in the past 20 years when a fruit grower 
could plant apples with such a certainty of profit, yet 
he wants to study carefully the conditions that he will 
be up against, and prepare to meet them. b. d. v. b. 
farmer who did not give PRIZE-WINNING AYRSHIRES, OWNED BY DR. C. S. HATCH, GAINESVILLE, N. Y. 
