
SKIM MILK FOR MILCH COWS. I49 
this number would drink it. Grain was placed on the milk, 
and water was withheld forty-eight hours, but all the expedi- 
ents used to induce the remaining twenty cows to drink the 
milk resulted in failure. The four cows, however, consumed 
the milk greedily and with apparent relish. One of the cows 
aborted during the trial, and her record is not reported. The 
records of the three cows receiving the skim milk and of nine 
cows receiving the ordinary ration are reported below. Skim 
milk was substituted for one-half the grain ration at the rate of 
eight pounds of skim milk to one of grain. In this proportion 
it was assumed that the total nutrients in the skim milk re- 
placed the digestible nutrients in the grain, pound for pound. 
The grain ration consisted of a mixture of four parts of bran 
and one part of cotton seed meal. During Period I. the three 
cows received skimmed milk in place of one-half the concen- 
trates, during Period II. grain only, and in Period III. the 
same as in Period I. ‘The roughage, consisting of hay and 
silage, was uniform during the three periods. The ration of 
the nine cows used as a check was uniform for the three periods. 
TABLE 68. 
Shim Milk vs. Grain. 










THREE COWS. Nine 
Cows on 
: | Uniform 
Ration. Product. Ration. 
BEE END SILAGE Concent’s. |Skim Milk) Milk Flow.|Milk Flow 
Pounds. Pounds. Pounds. |. Pounds. 
Period I., - - Uniform 252 2016 1335 2688 
‘ amount fed 
i a ; O none 1282 2678 
Period II., during three 504 j 
Period II1I., = periods. 252 2016 1383 2672 


Average increase, Periods I. and III., 75 pounds. 
For Periods I. and III., the average milk flow for the cows 
receiving skim milk was 1,359 pounds, or 75 pounds more than 
in Period II. /The money value of this increased milk flow, at 
three cents per quart, is $1.05. The 252 pounds of grain 
saved, at $22 per ton, is worth $2.77. The 2,016 pounds of 
skim milk resulted in a saving in this trial, therefore, of $3.82, 
_ which is equivalent to nineteen cents per cwt. 
