BARNS AND MILKING MACHINES

Te Ao Hou, Summer 1954, Page 42

BARNS AND MILKING MACHINES With temperatures below zero during the six months of winter, the housing of stock becomes a necessity, and large barns with upright silos are as common here as cowsheds back in New Zealand. Most of the barns are large wooden structures with shingled roofs, but fancy, tiled barns are not infrequent, the latter being run by businessmen from the larger cities like New York and Boston who still have money to spare after buying a Cadillac for each member of the family. All the older barns are built of chestnut, but a virus disease destroyed all the chestnut trees same 25 to 30 years ago. Hemlock, fir and spruce are the timbers most commonly used now, but some farmers are fortunate enough to have plantations of oak, which is a superior timber. The barns usually have high ceilings to provide ample ventilation, but forced ventilation is now common in newer buildings. The stock are lined down each side of the barn with their heads locked in stanchions. Leg ropes are not common. Enough room is allowed for the passage of feed barrows between the heads of the cattle and the wall, and the rows of cattle are separated by three to five yards. Pipeline milking machines, such as we have in New Zealand, are the envy of all Connecticut dairymen. Americans still use machines that deposit the milk in a bucket; they carry the bucket into the milkroom, which may be 50 yards or more in a big barn, empty it, and bring it back again — just like herd-testing day in New Zealand. Most farmers know about pipeline milking machines, but nobody seems over-anxious to install them.