New York AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENT STATION. 1838 
been caught under most favorable conditions and placed under 
the influence of formalin within a few minutes. 
CONNECTION BETWEEN BACTERIA IN THE UDDER AND ENZYMES IN THE 
MILK. 
Previous investigators have noted that there is considerable 
difference in the rate of change caused by enzymes in different 
samples of freshly drawn milk. These differences have been 
attributed to variations in the enzyme-forming activity of the 
milk glands, but we have been led to look for another explana- 
tion of these irregularities. The production of enyzmes on the 
part of certain classes of bacteria is well known, but the 
bacterial formation of enzymes in the udder, able to perform 
work in cheese ripening, is a possibility which has not been 
seriously considered. 
The work of Ward” has called attention to the fact that in 
many cases the interior of the udder is inhabited by certain 
microdrganisms which find the conditions favorable to their 
continued aevelopment. In working with certain Station cows 
we have found that in some cases large numbers of germs were 
present in the milk last drawn. This condition existed when- 
ever examinations were made during a period of some months. 
By comparing the germ content of the whole mess of milk, 
after rejecting the milk first drawn, with the germ content of the 
milk last drawn, or strippings, it is often found that the number 
present in the whole mess exceeds that in the strippings by an 
amount hardly larger than would be expected as a result of 
unavoidable contamination during milking. 
This is shown in the following table which gives the number 
of bacteria found per cubic centimeter in the whole mess and in 
the strippings from each quarter of a single cow at three 
successive milkings. In all cases the first few streams from 
each quarter were rejected. : 
Babcock and Russell. See No. 10. 
* ®Ward. Bul. No. 178 Cornell Exp. Sta. (1900). 
