MR. McCALLUM IN WAIKATO.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXV, Issue 9146, 30 August 1888, Page 6

MR. McCALLUM IN WAIKATO.

[FROM OUR OWN' CORRESPONDENTS. 1 Hamilton, Wednesday. Mr, McCallum was in Hamilton yesterday, and visited Mr. Reynolds' butter factory at j Newstead. On his return your correspon- j dent had an interview with Mr. McCallum, •when that gentlemen informed him that he i should be unable to visit the Waikoto dis- j trict in detail, as he had been suddenly sum- i moned away by telegram, and had to leave | for Auckland to-day. It would have pleased | him much to have met the settlers in ! various parts of the district and dis- j cussed with them the practical science of dairying, both cheese and butter making. •Mr. McCallum is, however, an advocate of the factory system rather than of private dairying. The industry he looks upon as one of trie most importance in the colony, and he looks to Loudon as our market. Our local market may of course be supplied from well-conducted private dairies, but the factory system can alone, he believes, build up an export trade which will command the English market, for by the factory system only can butter of a uniform quality be produced, and the local factories by joining totogether and making up large and regular shipments., can arrange better terms with shippers for the care and carriage of their butter. Experience has shown that cool chambers for the carriage of butter seawards is a necessity, as butter otherwise sent is sure to sweat more or less upon the passage and become deteriorated in quality. Snippers could not be expected to provide cool compartments where the consignments of butter ihipped were desultory and uncertain, as they mast needs be if the shipments were made in small bulk from private dairies. With respect to the failure of so many of the cooperated dairy factories in the North, Mr. McCallum pointed out the suggestive fact that in the South similar factories, with no other advantages of market, had paid both good dividends and far higher prices to milk suppliers than in the North. One thing he had noticed, that the sites of some of our dairy factories had been ill-chosen, where there had "been insufficient facilities for drainage with an inadequate water supply, for without the most scrupulous cleanliness dairying ■ must ever be a failure. Speaking of the adulteration of milk supplied and percentage of cream, Mr. McCallum thought that blame had frequently been laid undeservedly at the door of the milk suppliers, the tests having been improperly made. It was very easy, either by not heating the milk to be tested to the proper temperature, to produce a poor • result, and equally possible on the other hand by neglecting to stir up the milk in a can to obtain too favourable a result from milk taken from the top of it. To ensure success in cheese and butter making required not only the excellent machinery and accessories •which he found in the Waikato factories, but skilled management within the factory and an intelligent co-operation of the milk supplier with the factory manager in such management. In cheese-making the inattention of the cheesemaker for a few minutes it one particular period of the process, the Deing two minutes too soon or too late in attention to a certain particular, would result in the whole making of that day being of inferior quality, and the spoiling of perhaps half a ton of cheese. On the other hand, if milk suppliers were not scrupulously clean in treating the milk while in their hands, if they hurried the cows up with dogs to the milking sheds, no skill on the part of the factory manager could make up for these evils, for if the blood of the cows was heated by driving previous to milking, first--class cheese or butter could not be made from the milk. How careless milk suppliers were, in the matter of cleanliness while in the milking shed, or in the vessels they used, • could De seen by an examination of the separator after it had run down when too often bv far too large a proportion of dirt remained. Mr. McL-allum expressed a hope that on another occasion he might be able to re-visit the district, and enter fully into the theory and practice of dairying with the settlers who would meet him in the various districts, and such meeting weuld be productive of much benefit to the settlers, for in Mr. McCallum the Government appears to have departed from the too common practice of making a billet for the man, and has found the man for the —earnest, practical, and experienced. Paterangi, Wednesday. Mr. McCallum, the Government inspector of dairying, visited this district on Monday, and was? shown over the factory by Mr. Ryburn. Mr. McCallum expressed himself pleased with the clas3 of machinery used, And expressed himself surprised that with che appliances, the result of last season's operations had been bo unsatisfactory. He atrongly recommended the leasing of the factory to the company forming for that purpose, and which opens at NgarUawahia in October.