DRY LAND FARMING IN EASTERN COLORADO 
9 
a field on his farm as soon as he can. Corn fodder raised in the high 
altitudes of eastern Colorado is a good milk producing feed, entirely 
different from the coarse product of the corn belt. The fodder from 
kafir corn and sorgum makes a good dairy feed if cut after the 
plants have headed, and not later than when the seed begins to harden. 
A full supply of ripe sorghum seed will soon dry up a cow. All 
fodders should be cut and cured to keep the leaves as green as possible. 
Hay from wheat, oats or beardless barley makes a good milk feed. 
The crop should be cut when the seed is in the thick milk and cured 
with as little exposure to the sun as possible. If there is a low place 
on the farm upon which the surface water from the unbroken fields 
can be carried-by a few furrows, plant it with stock beets. Feed lo 
to 20 pounds per cow daily. Crushed barley, ground wheat and the 
gram of milo maize are the dry land grains for dairy feed. 
A daily variety in feeding forage crops will secure a larger milk 
yield than the method of feeding one kind exclusively for several 
weeks and then another. The most profit comes from feeding ail the 
cow will eat every day. F ive cows full fed will yield more profit than 
ten or fifteen cows sparsely fed. Feeding should begin early in the 
summer or fall before the cows begin to shrink in their milk. 
Handling the Cozv. 
The cow needs in v/inter a warm, dry shelter, free from draughts. 
This can be made of straw, or of sod walls and straw or sod roofs, 
if lumber can not be afforded. Bales of straw will last for years, 
when used for stable walls, if the top of the walls are protected from 
rain. The cows in summer should have# a shelter from the sun. 
This should be placed on the highest point in the pasture arfd can be 
made by setting up posts and putting over them a straw roof built so 
high that the cows can not eat it. Such a shelter will furnish shade 
and will be cool when the wind blows through it. 
About 87 per cent, of milk is water, and the cow, to do her best, 
must have all she wants easily accessible. Salt should be kept in 
a box where she can eat it at will. Whatever adds to the comfort of 
a dairy cow increases the yield; discomfort decreases the yield. Kind¬ 
ness increases the milk yield and costs nothing. The more a milker 
can make a cow love him, as she loves her calf, the more milk she will 
give. Petting is profitable. The cow should never be driven faster 
than a slow walk. All feed should be given after milking as the 
dust from the feed contains the germs which sour the milk. Feed¬ 
ing and milking should be done at exactly the same hours, morning 
and night. The cow should be milked ten months each year, and on 
the Plains it is best to let her go dry through February and March. 
It will usually pay the new settler to sell the calves for veal, and 
give all the feed he raises to the cows giving milk, as this will secure 
the quickest cash returns. A good calf may be raised on skim milk 
and either shelled corn, the whole grain of milo maize or crushed 
