CORRESPONDENCE

Taranaki Daily News, 23 August 1930, Page 15

CORRESPONDENCE

THE CHEESE ARGUMENT. (To the Editor). Sir, —In a recent issue you published a letter from ’‘Another Old Farmer.” I am pleased to note that the old chap is still alive, but wish he would take a few monkey glands and thereby bring him back to a more youthful frame of mind, so that he could comply with the modern ideas of dairying. Perhaps :he does not quite grasp the situation of to-day as compared with that of 30 years ago. I do not "remember as far back as that myself, hut from what I have heard, the factories in those days did not quite come up to the size of same to-day, with vats holding a few thousand gallons of milk, being rushed, through in six to seven hours and coming out at the end of that time like soft soap. Probably with their more primitive methods they took longer, as Mr. Veale says should be done now, and turned out a better cheese. He says in England cheese-makers “can beat us to the tune of something like 20s a cwt.” We are glad the English cheesemakers sing during the longer hours they spend making their cheese. Our cheese-makers > are always growling for shorter hours and more money. 1 suppose cheese does not deteriorate going Home. It would bo interesting to know how “Another Old Farmer” would feel after being in a freezer for seven to eight weeks — worth less than 20s, I’ll warrant.

“A.0.F.” quotes Mr. Veale of three years ago, not Mr. Veale of to-day. Three years ago that gentleman carried out experiments to find the best milk for cheese-making. I did not notice much effect of the results of those experiments in this district. Everybody went on as usual getting paid for the cheese and the extra butter-fat produced from the whey skimming,' which the “almighty, little Jersey” is bound to give. To-day Mr. Veale is looking to improve the cheese through the manufacture —a sound idea. The report of his investigations to my young mind was very good. It may bring matters a little clearer to “A.0.F.” if 1 say that if ho has been milking, as a great many farmers have been without alterations, on the same place for 20 to 30 years, in all probability he needs an inspector round his cowshed. I have seen some that have only been up 10 years, and it would be a brave inspector that got anywhere near them. “A.0.F.” rather contradicts himself. In the first part of his letter, he laughs to. scorn the idea of inspectors, and a little later he says, “wo should be broadminded enough to heed what our scientist and other notable authorities have to say.” Who suggested inspection? Inspection is certainly beneficial. At Home, according to our friend, the cheesemakers sing to the milk; out here it is sometimes the reverse.

I do not want to hold too much “brief” for the Jersey, because “A.0.F.” holds none, but it may interest him to know that the Australian championship for eheddar cheese was won a year or two back by a factory manager near here, and that the average test at that factory ranges from 4.2 to 4.f1. Again, “A.0.F.” would be at a great loss if ho milked Holsteins instead of “almighty little Jerseys” when the payout is made on solids, because at the British Dairy Farmers’ Association’s milking trials, held for a period of six years, for “comparative yields of different breeds,” it was found that the Jersey finished highest, with 34.Slbs milk, and 28.35 per cent, total solids; Holstein, 47.31bs milk, 24.09 solids; Shorthorn, 48.81bs milk, 25/56 solids; Ayrshire, 40.21bs milk, 2.5.1 solids, as quoted by Mr. Primrose MacConncll. So that the position is not quite so serious as “Another Old Farmer’ thinks “under the present condition of affairs.” —I am, etc.,

YOUNG FARMER. Pukcaruhe, August 21, 1939.