COWS NOT STRIPPED

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume 50, Issue 3056, 31 March 1941, Page 4

COWS NOT STRIPPED

YIELD NOT AFFECTED

TWO MEN MILK HERD OF 150

An opinion opposed to some - that had been given at earlier sittings of the board, and also to positive statements by dairy authorities elsewhere, was expressed at the sitting of the No. 2 Armed Forces Appeal Board in Hamilton last week by an appellant!, who told of two men milking a herd of 150 cows. It had been claimed by some authorities that a large enough unit for one man to handle was 30 cows, so that on that basis the two men should have had charge of a herd of about 60 cows. Actually they had 150 cows, and the evidence showed that they tackled their morning task at 4 a.m. and. the milk was on the way to the factory at about 7.30.

The electrically-operated milking plant in use was a seven-cow one, which enabled 14 cows to be.bailed at once. One of the most startling remarks by the witness was that if a third man were employed in the shed he would be in- the way. He described as ‘‘nonsense” a suggestion that only about 30 cows should be handled by one man.

In further questioning it transpired that the practice was not to strip the cows, and witness justified this, course by saying that he found that the cows continued lactation just as well as those that were regularly stripped. There was no noticeable drop in butterfat as compared with the almost universal practice of stripping.