WATER DRINKING BY COWS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXI, Issue 16, 4 September 1911, Page 3

WATER DRINKING BY COWS.

NO INFLUENCE ON MILK YIELD. The attention of the Department of Agriculture in England was directed during the past year to notices in the press as to the conviction of a dairyman in the French Courts for selling adulterated ' milk. The conviction was based on the assumption that it is possible to water milk either by feed-

ing cows on watery food, or by causing them to drink water in largo quantities, or immediately before being milked.’ The Department was not aware of any sufficient evidence to show that when the total supply of nourishment is sufficient it. is possible to increase the quantity of milk, at the expense of the quality, by these moans; and as they considered that the dissemination of incorrect information o:: M ns subject among officers of local antue-. ities and others might load to hardships to dairymen, they referred the matter to the Agricultural Education iAssociation, and arranged uith 'thdm to conduct experiments at the Midland Agricultural and Dairy College to test the points raised,

Seven typical 1 dairy cows were selected from the college herd of the dual purpose Shorthorn typo. These cattle were' stall fed during the whole of the 1 time the experiment was in progress. Their food consisted of concentrated dry fodders, with the addition of mangels, and at stated intervals—viz., every seventh day—it was supplemented with a definite amount of salt.

The t quantity’‘hf water taken daily was measured by allowing each cow to drink from a graduated vessel. During the first, week access to water was continuous; during the second, intermittent. Milking was regularly and expeditiously done, the interval between successive milking being 10 ana 3-1 hours, evening and morning respectively. The effect of the salt, was to be determined by the variation in the yield of milk and its‘quality. The latter was done by sampling the milk from each cow at each milking, and analysing the milk for fat and solids during the same day.

'i ho cows were numbered 1 to 7, and the scheme was mapped out. in days. On the first day No. 1 received ■foz. of salt; on the second day No. 2 was salted, and so on. Thus one day in eacli week a cow received salt, and on every day of that week some one cow was receiving salt. For the first seven days each cow had free access to a measured quantity of water. In the second week she was allowed to drink only just before being milked. In the till ret week water was free, in the fourth intermittent. From the experience g;yucd in the first two weeks the experiment was altered so that instead of giving loz. of salt in one meal, Boz. were given alter the night’s milking on the* one day, and doz. alter the morning’s milking on the next. The feeding of Goz. of salt caused purging. / ho result of tlie experiment showed that, periodical doses of common salt administered to cows, oven to the extent of purging them, do not necessarily cause them to consume excessive quantities of water, and that the quantity of water consumed by cows has no direct, hearing on the composition of their milk yield.