PAPERS READ AT PALMERSTON NORTH DURING SHOW WEEK.

Otago Witness, Issue 2677, 5 July 1905, Page 21

PAPERS READ AT PALMERSTON NORTH DURING SHOW WEEK.

i ___ ___ SOME ASPECTS OF THE DAIRY INDUSTRY FROM THE CHEMIST'S STANDPOINT. FERTILISER INGREDIENTS IN NEW ZEALAND EXPORTS. (Wrtten for the Dairy Conference by Chief Chemist B. C. Astox, and read by Mr J. F. Harkness.) — Milk.— Let us first consider what is the composition of milk. This, as you know, consists mainly of water (87-88 per cent.). Some misguided persons have thought that ■uith even this high amount of water it docs not constitute a safe food product, and doubtless taking the fact that for human infants it must be diluted before .use, hare endeavoured to cave fond mothers this trouble. Such gallantry on the p_art of the milkman is apt to meet with such a recognition from the energetic dairy inspector as to lead to some slight augmentation of the colony's surplus. By this means have been added to our revenue during the past year some £80 sterling. But, revenons a' nous moutons, the other 12 or 13 per cent, is termed the solids of milk, and is stated in analysis as so much total solid?. These consist of butter-fat (3 to 4 per cent.), milk sugar (5 per cent.), albuminoids, the main constituent of cheese (3 to. 4- per cent.), and ash (.75 per cent.). The fat and milk sugar are composed of the elements carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen, and in themselves entail no drain on the resources of the soil, as the carbon is derived mainly from the carbon dioxide of the atmosphere, in which there is the constant supply of .04- per cent., and the oxygen and hydrogen come from the water. I can't tell you what amount of this constituent there is to draw from, but think that most of you, especially those who hail from Taranaki, will concede me that we have .enough. The proteids, or albuminoids, of milk are mainly represented in the curd, and contain about 6 per cent, of nitrogen, which is obtained through the plant from the nitrates of the soil. The removal of the nitrates from the soil, of course, reduces its fertility, but soils have the faculty of automatically recuperating from this waste in a manner which is not entirely understood. Leguminous plants play an important role in this process in fixing the free nitrogen of the air ; there is also a contribution of combined nitrogen from the atmosphere -which ie washed in by the rain. There is, however, over and above these sources 'of supply some other means by which nitrogen is obtained. At Rothamsted in 1903 I saw a -field which has grown wheat, a nitrogen-loving crop, continuously for 60 years without a fertiliser having been used or any rotation kept. The ■ yield of grain was then constant at about 13 bushels, which would be removing about 161b of nitrogen per acre from the soil every year. The ash (.75 per cent.) of , milk is the cause of the real drain of this product on the soil, but as this constituent is not exported, but i«, or should be, re- , turned to the farm in the shape of skim milk or whey, it need not be considered . in this paper. Sufficient be it to note that j the ash contains phosphoric acid equal to 64- per cent, of tricalcie phosphate and 29 i per cent, of potash, so that every 10 gallons of milk will contain about i\h of potash and 2-slb of tricalcic phosphate. | —Butter.— j Let us' now turn to the composition of butter. Tins is the fat of the milk separated as far as possible from the other constituents of that fluid. In New Zealand it contains from 2 to 3 per cent, of curd (nitrogenous substance), and only .2 per cent, of ash natuial to the butler. This is usually increased by the addition of 2 per cent, of salt. The remaining constituent is, of course, water, which here averages about 10 per cent. Therefore, the 15,000 tons of butter which we exported last year would remove from the country only 31 tons of I ash — an amount so small that it is not worth considering, even admitting that it may consist largely of phosphate of lime. The nitrogen may be calculated by estimating that the curd contains 16 per cent. We thus arrive at the figure of 63 tons of nitrogen exported. — Cheese. — This is derived from ihe cuid and fat of milk, being practically the milk solids, minus the milk sugar, altered by tho process of "ripening." Cheese has a greater Aariation in its composition than either milk or butter, and the amounts of nitrogenous matter and ash aio much greater. For the purpose of comparison a\c may estimate tbo proportion of ash at 4 per ceni. and the nitiogfii at 5 per cent. Po=sibly there may be Ij. per cent, of tiicalcic phosphate. The potash is very in^ignificartt — 2 5 pci cent, cf the a.^li only. *vCe then arnvc at the following figures for the 4327 tons of eheose exported la^t year: — Nitrogen, 216 tons, ash, 173 ton-., containing 65 toiu of tricalcic phosphate. — Beef Carcases and Hides. — I iaLo these as a type of flesh exports in preference to the products of the sheep, as much land in New Zealand is only suitable for the latter class of stock. Moreover, the raising of beef is largely comple-

mental to the dairy industry. Under this heading the figures are mexely approximate owing to the difficulty of obtaining accurate information. They will, however, serve to demonstrate the facts to which I am leading up. Consider that the average beef carcase as exported is made up as follow* : 71.4 per cent, flesh, 13.7 ver cent, bones, 14.9 per cent, fat,— total" 100. Ihe flesh contains 77 per cent, of water, the 25 per cent, of dry matter contains 15 per cent, of nitrogen, and the bones contain nearly 50 per cent, of tricalcic phosphate, and 4 per cent, of nitrogen. The flesh will also contain a little tricalcic phosphate in the ash (1 to 2 per cent.) ant 1 potash (.3 per" cent.). From these figures we may deduce the fact that the carcases contain, say, 5 per cent, of nitrogen, 7 per _cent. of -tricalcio phosphate, and 9 per "cent, of ash. The beef carcases exported for the year was 9095 tons (a diminution, let it be noted, of 5000 tons as compared with the previous year). These would "therefore contain 273 tons of nitrogen and 637 tons of tricalcio phosphate. The hides (mostly green) exported were 1360 tons. One-quarter of their weight being dry matter (which contains, say, 18 per cent, of nitrogen) therefore represents 61 tons of nitrogen. — Oats.— Let us now glance at cereal-. I will take ais a type oats, as this is the cereal we export in largest amount, being 92,200 tons last year (a decrease of 15,000 tons compared with the previous year). Oats contain about 3 per cent, of ash, 1.65 per cent, of • nitrogen, phosphoric acid equal to 1.55 par cent, of tricalcic phosphate, 'and .5 net cent, of potash. It is therefore apparent that cereals are the most exhaustive product that we export. We have now "all the data before us for the compilation of the following table, taking the value of nitrogen at 10s -ocr unit, potash at 7s, and phosphate of lime at 2s, there being 100 units in a, ton. — Fertilisers Contained in Some Exports Tor the Year Ending March 31, ]&05 —

From the table we may compile the proportion of fertilising ingredients in terms of value which each product, also in terms of value, is responsible for extracting from the soil and from the country, thus : — - Proportion of Contained Fertiliser Value to the Maiket Value of Produce.— Butter _£?ljs _ 1,416.480 Eay ' Sua Cheese £116 300 _ £015 870 ~ Say> 2 °" j Carcases and Hides £54,025 _ , i 28 ,785 ~ Say> ir Oats ... ... jEVC.27O 418,493 ~ 7> 4~4 ~ Batter, therefore, removes s l o*fo0 *fo of ita value of fertiliser from the soil, wjiiie cheese takes 2 V*» beef -^b, and oats jtb. It may be- taken as a general axiom in agriculture that the mo-t economical method of utilising a soil is to keep the production and export of produce which consists mainly of ingredients derned from the soil to a minimum, and to increase- the produce •which is mainly composed of matter from tho atmosphere to a maximum. This must be, of course, read in conjunction with the. 1 dative cost of fertiliser' in the district and the facility -with which a soil may be lecuperated by natural agencies, such as weathering or food-bearing floods. Thus tho country which exports alcohol, oil, starch, and butter — products which are- composed! of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen only — or merely fattens cattle which have been raised elsewhere is not depleting its store of plant food, particularly phosphates, in the soil, provided that it utilises its skim milk, whey, refuse from the distillery and wine press-, oil cake, animal excreta, and bones judici-) ously. What is here true of the State may, i of course, be applied with equal force toi

ft't, individual. In addition to treatment { With"' these waste products the land will be. kept in good' heart by the natural weathering' of soil particles, assisted by an occa- ; •iionaF top-clressing of lime, which will set \ free' phosphoric acid and potash; the nitroeen^bacteria will supply that element, and therefore th.c continual restoration of the loiFs disturbed equilibrium be assured. — Raising the Stand ird 1 of the Dairy 'Oavr.— Dairymen should periodically ascertain irhat .amounF of butter-fat is being given ,by each individual cow, in order that i beasts which give a Iqw yield of i but«r-fat may be eliminated from* the herd i and /more economical animals^pntained 1 . It would not cost the dairymen more than six•pence per sample — I have known one firm .offer 10 do 't for threepence— to give a 4 Babcoek test of each sample. Apart from the adulteration of milk, Vhich is toe rife in this new country, there is no i ' , ,dcubt that a number of herds give low ! results. A systematic examination for fat • of the milk of every co« r in the country * '. , could, I am sure, be undertaken at the - above estimate, with great benefit to the dairy industry and cou-itry. In connection with Babcook-testing, attention might here be called to the experience- of the Urtitod States Department of ' Agriculture, which recommends the use of r arrow-necked bottles in order to get wide divisions of scale For cream-testing the 30, 40, and [0 per cent. 6in bottles, j>er cent, were found most accurate ; the 50 per cent. 9ia bottles, graduated to 5 ' per cent., were next in accuracy; but the ' 30, 40, and 50 per cent. 6in bottles, .which jire largely used in New Zealand, [ wer&.foand to be too inaccurate, in their -results' for their use to be recommended. Importers are. therefore, asked to obtain -only that class of ware which is here ad- ■ ,vised. — Preservatives in Butter. — ■ - The only cloud on the horizon in connec- ] tion with the export of butter is at present j the question of preservatives. At present it is only a jloud, but it may develop | into a thunderstorm. Knowing that the -j matter is receiving the earnest attention of 3 our indefatigable Dairy Commissioner, I! < will content myself with merely alluding ' . to the recent work of Dr Wiley, chief of . . the U.S. Bureau of Chemistry at the U.S. < Department of Agriculture. Washington, } who found the long-contir.ued administration of borio aoid in small doses to i have a distinctly harmful effect on the , human animal. As New Zealanders con- 1 fume large quantities of butter with their food— perhaps as much as 70 or 80 grams ( toe day — the matter is worth investigating, { from tne public health, as well as from the J exporters', point of view. ] — "Water :n Butter. — ] The table Which I give below shows the j result of a ooniparisoi of New Zealand £ butters with the other butters of the world i with regard to their contents of water. It t c will be seen that New Zealand wins first j J place easily. Enough analyses of Australian ' butters have not been published to show c whether ifc is justly entitled to the second \ place, but provisionally it is placed ther#, c The United States follows next in order, g if, indeed, they do not precede Australia, t fer gland, Canada, Holland, Germany, i France, Ireland, Sweden, and Denmark fol- t |ow in the orcfer given. The result of inalyses of 17,332 samples of butter collated a fiom all sources (apparently excluding New t Zealand) by Herr Benno Martipy gives a s general average of 13.55 per cent, of water, t A number of analyses of German butters v t3 given by this authority which 6^how t from 20 to 65 per cent, of -water. The Ifi •>• icajority of these wore, of course, highly t idudtelated. but it is. interesting as show- 1

{ ing how much butter could be made to . contain. To remove as little water as possible, or to add water or skim milk to a ; dry buttei", like that of New Zealand, is ; a practice which is widely followed in England and flhe Continent, The standard for water recently recommended for adoption in England is 16 per cent., with a margin of .9. Under this a butter which contains 17 per cent, or more of water will be held to be adulterated. No .standard has, however, been fixed for this colony, though there is a limit for butter-fat (8 Oper cent.), . which the Food and Drug Bill, recently | drafted by the Public Health Department, j raises to 82 per cent. It may here be noted that Mr Otto Hehner (representing the Institute of Chemistry and the Society of Public Analysts) stated in his evidence before the Departmental Committee appointed to inquire into the matter of th© regulations under section 4 of "The Sale of Food* and Drugs Act, 1899," for butter, I that the percentage of water in Siberian ; butter was only 8 per cent., but did not [ say whether analyses were made in Engi land or Russia. Mr J. C Lovell stated before 'the tame committee that Siberian butters lost about 1 per cent, in transit. No analyses of Siberian butter have been published, unless we except five Russian samples which this witness said were analysed by Mr Hehner, and said to contain* 9.2 per cent of water. It is therefore quite possible that Siberia may produce ji drier butter than even New Zealand. How necessary it, is, then, that we should maintain cur present high standard of dryness in order that we may compete with Siberia, who has her geographical advantage of being nearer the market than we are ! | — Appendix. — Some of the evidence given before the Departmental Committee of the Beard of Agriculture on butter is worth repeating. Mr J. C Lovell, representative of the Provision Trade Section of the London Cl-amtier of Commerce, who is also chairman of Messrs Lovell and Christmas (Limited), stated "the butter that shows the smallest percentage of water in the natural slate is New Zealand butter . . . Since the 4fcJi May, 1901, I have taken a number of samples, and had thf>m analysed by Mr. Hehner. . . . They seem there to ta(ke out nearly all tho moisture that it is possible to get out. "Taking these 77 samples, I find that the average of water in them worked out; at 12.5. There are^ 33 French samples, Tihich show 13.9 per cent. ; 12 Irish samples, which show 13 06 pe p cent. ; 6 Danish samples, which show 32 7 per cent. ; 3 Swedish samples, which show 12.4- per cent.; 2 Italian samples, which, show 14.9 per cent. ; 10 New Zealand samples, which show 8.8 per cent. ; 4 Australian samples, which show 12.2 per cent. ; 1 Argentine sample, which shows 10.4 per cent. ; and 1 sample from tho United 1 States, which shews 11.4 per cent. ; and 5 Russian samples, which show 9 2 per cent." The New Zealand butter contains, according to your analysis, 8.8 per cent of water. In your opinion, does the general quality of the butter otherwise suffer from Striving after this extreme dryness? — "On the oonirify, tho drier the butter, the less moisture there is in it, the better it keeps." Would you regard the dfyuess of butter as perhaps its most important characteristic? — "If you were judging butter at a. show for prizes, that is certainly one of the cardinal points — that you want as little water as possible." Surely you would take the flavour first? — "We take all things into consideration, but that is one of the points I sa ; d. ThcAa shouts are generally jj.-etty warm..

They are held in tents, or places put up on purpose, and if you have a butter which has scarcely any moisture in it you will find that it will hold out to the end of the show if it lasts three or four days; whereas a butter which might be quite sweet the first day of the show, if it contains a lot of moisture, will have gone off before the show closes. I have seen that repeatedly." Would you go so far as to <-ay that if the butter contained more than your limit of vater the flavour would suffer? — "It would in keeping, but it might not at the moment when it was first made." If it were made with salt? — "Then it would keep longer than it would without." — Content of Water in Butter. —

1. British Blue Book "Butter" (C 1039) p. 313. 2. British Blue Book "Butter" (C 1039 p. 14Q. 3. U.S. Dept. of Agr. Bureau of Animal Industry, Circular 39. 4. British Blue Book "Butter" (C 1039) pp. 322-3-4. 5. Percentage of water in Canadian Creamery Buttei, Canadian Dept. of Agr. 6. British Blue Book "Butter" (C 1039) p. 297. 7. British, Blue Book "Butter" (C 1039) p. 237. 8. British Bine Book "Butter" (C 1039) p. 292. 9. British Blue Book "Butter" (C 1039) p. 329. 10. British Blue Book "Butter" (C 1039) p. 329. New Zealand. Canada, and United States of America are the three countries producing the driest butters, and the following tabular statement shows the superiority of the New Zealand butter. No details of Australian butter analysis arc available. — Classification of Butters according to Percentage of Water. —

opinions of experts in the Ol<|_ Country, that New Zealand creamery butter is the diiest on the market. The following extiaet from an annual report of the Chief Dairy Commissioner (Mr J. A. Kinsella) shows how this excellent result has been reached : It will be interesting, indeed, for the purchasers of New Zealand butter in Great Britain to note the comparatively low percentage of water, and consequently tho high percentage of fat, contained in New Zealand butter. It only requires a glimpse over the records of the analysis to beeom3 convinced that uniformity exists in the process of manufacture in the various butter factories in the colony. This uniformity has been largely brought about by the building of butter factories, by the- installing of more up-to-date machinery in them, by the introduction of more approved methods of manufacture as advocated by this division, and by the better application of refrigerating power throughout the whole process of manufacture. The almost absolute control which every factory of any importance has over both the cream and butter is where the secret lies in New Zealand being able to make such a uniformly dry, honest butter.

Ml £ 3 O5 I CO so" •qSß^oj [ H 1 1O gj I -* =41 o So I •ajßTidsoTuoioirouj, J -2 IS I I •(JII3D j .Tad i)^inn lad SQf { %v anitsA pa^iu^sa i 2 "A CD CO Co" I ■na2o3!j.TjvT I gS 5 CO Si s 5i |BJBniT\[ CO 00 so CO CO •anpfA ?321-t«W CM TO " o" oo" » 5 •jjtinoiny to 25 eS o'- ci F-S" "* 10 CTS O o o §3 88" •aouie;sc|Tig I I__ a ca I 5 o eS o ca 3 5 45 5

New TJ.S , Zealand. Canada. America. Percentage o| « 'SJ g «g g g Water. fcj g g g ielow 8 ** — ~ i „95 3 .37 ietween 8 and 3 „ 15 4.52 i .95 17 2.12 9 „ 10 j» 60 18.08 4 3^o 55 6.86 10 f, 11 *-. 118 35.55 .15 14.29 124 15.46 11 f, 12 .. 89 26.80 24 22.86 267 33.29 12 „ 13 *". 36 10.84 23 21.90 178 22.20 13 s , 14 12 3.61 24 22.86 105 13.09 14 „15 .« 1 .30 10 9.53 36 4.49 15 ,< 16 .« 1 .30 2 1.91 9 1.12 16 „17 .. — — 1 .95 8 1.03 332 100.00 105 100.00 802 100.00 These analyses bear fiuj fiomßletely; the

». Average No. of Per- Samples centage. Analysed. New Zealand .. .. 10.37 .332 2 Australian — Victoria . . 11.14 4S 1 „ (State not given) 11.81 7 3 U.S., America .. .. 11.03 61 „ Creameries 11.73 730 10 English 12.08 334 5 Canadian », .» ». 12.31 105 4 Dutch— Dremthe „ .. 11.97 174 Goningen, t . .. 12.11 88 Friesland .. .. 13.25 233 10 German .., ..., „ 13.01 1,107 10 French .. *. 13.40 225 6 IrishUlster ,„ .. .. 13.19 269 Munster .. ti „. 14.57 2,8G5 Leinster „ .. 12.26 629 Connaught .. „ 13.69 253 7 Swedish — Creameries t « 13.57 8,310 8 Danish — Summer .* 14.03 2 001 Winter .. .... 14.41 1,930 9 All Countries (Martiny) 13.55 17,33"2