8 
COLORADO EXPERIMENT STATION 
More than the usual amount was shipped into the state from the east 
and several carloads from the Pacific Coast. 
The fresh milk from 8,000 average Colorado cows would have 
been required to produce the condensed milk that was shipped into 
Colorado in 1909, and the milk from 16,000 cows to fully supply the 
demand in the state for this food. 
Every section of Colorado offers favorable conditions for dairy¬ 
ing. The irrigated sections of Colorado offer ideal conditions in every 
respect:—feed, climate, water, and good markets. 
The mountain parks and valleys of Colorado furnish almost the 
same dairy conditions as the mountain dairy districts of New York, 
with the advantages of richer feeds and a dry climate. These parks 
and valleys cover a large area, a single one—the San Luis Valley— 
having a tillable acreage as great as the entire state of Connecticut. 
Good, early cut alfalfa hay will produce as much milk as an equal 
weight of bran, one of the chief eastern dairy feeds. Alfalfa hay can 
be produced and fed to dairy cows on the average Colorado farm for 
$3 to $5 a ton. Bran in eastern dairy sections costs $20 and upwards 
a ton. A ton of alfalfa hay contains about as much milk producing 
material as four tons of timothy hay. 
Alfalfa grows well in most sections of Colorado up to an altitude 
of 8,000 feet From 6,500 to 8,000 feet field peas give high yields. 
Both the hay and grain from this crop are good milk producing feeds, 
pea hay ranking next to alfalfa for this purpose. 
At high altitudes red and alsike clover yield large crops, the latter 
doing well up to an altitude of 9,500 feet. Both are rich milk pro¬ 
ducing feeds. The nutritious character of Colorado forage crops 
makes little grain necessary. 
To the many new settlers who are starting dry land farming on 
the plains of eastern Colorado, dairying offers a sure income. In the 
past thirty-three years there has never been a year so dry but that 
a sufficient quantity of feed could have been raised, together with the 
native grasses, to produce a good yield of milk. 
The native grasses are good milk producing feeds, summer and 
winter. The Sorghums, Milo and Kafir-corn are good drought re¬ 
sisting crops, and in a dry year wheat, oats and beardless barley cut 
just as they are filling make excellent dairy feeds and often a profit¬ 
able crop can be secured from these grains by making them into hay, 
when if left to mature the season would be too* dry for them to make 
marketable grain. 
The mild climate of Colorado makes the necessary expense low 
for shelter. For twenty years the average temperature at Fort Col¬ 
lins for January—the coldest month—has been twenty-six degrees, and 
for July, the warmest month, sixty-eight degrees, with a few days 
each year of either extreme heat or cold. 
The dry bracing air and high altitude give vitality and health to 
the cows. Dr. George H. Glover reports that only one-half of one 
