THE DAIRY.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 658, 3 October 1884, Page 11

THE DAIRY.

DAIRY QUESTIONS. Messrs. Waltz & Wcener, of Montana Ter., ask us several questions on dairy matters. Our answers to some of them will indicate th 6 questions. It takes a little over eight “ pounds of milk to make a gallon, ” and about two gallons of good “ milk to make a pound of butter. ” Yet it will require three or even four gallons of some milk for a pound of butter. It will not pay to make butter, except for your own use, even at sixty cents a pound, if you can sell the milk at twenty-five cents a gallon, unless indeed you have a sale for sweet skimmilk in some form, at eight to twelve cents a gallon. Jersey cows are generally below medium size, and are no fighters. They would be underlings in a herd of “ common ranch cows. ” They will yield on an average eight or ten quarts of milk a day for six to eight months, and during this time ought to average a pound to a pound and a quarter of butter a day. The “ amount of butter made from noted cows” has in some cases exceeded three pounds a day, week after week. It is a very good one that yields fourteen pounds a week. Jersey cows fit to ship, would cost you in the East two hundred and fifty to three hundred dollars each, in carload lots. Orange carrots are better than white, because they help to keep up the color of the butter in winter, and are nearly as productive. Carrots and mangles mixed make excellent food for cows in winter, especially if well sprinkled after slicing with equal parts by weight of bran and corn meal. — American Agriculturist. PROLONG THE MILKING SEASON of cows. It is well known that there is much difference in the length of time cows continue in milk in the same herd, and with the same treatment. Some cows give milk but seven months, while others continue nine or ten months. This difference is mainly a matter of breed and of training during the first season of the heifer's milking. The Jersey and their grades are generally better fed and run easily from the start, into a long milking season, not infrequently up to the time of calving, where this is desired. But in any breed the season may be prolonged by the care of the heifer with her first calf, and during the first milking season. She should be kept in good condition all through the months of pregnancy, and, if practicable, drop her calf in the fall, when the barns are full and there is an abundant store of milk-producing food. With good hay, and regular rations of roots and meal, and kind treatment, the habit of giving milk through the winter may be thoroughly established. In a family cow this habit adds much to her value.