The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1878-11-28
Feeding Cows in Fall.

DAIRYING was formerly carried on
generally in a very careless, slipshod
way. A COW was a COW, and was sup
posed to give milk from some inherent
power, regardless of the manner of
keeping. Now, thanks to dairymen's
associations and the more careful dis
cussions in agricultural journals, dairy
men are studying their speciality with
much more care and attention to all its
particulars. Few now believe that they
can draw milk from the udder unless
it first goes in at the mouth. They do
not expect the cow to produce some
thing from nothing, and they are in
quiring anxiously about the best foods
to produce milk, and the best methods
Of feeding. They study, not only the
valuable characteristics of the differ
ent breeds, but the methods of perpetu-
ating them.
This refers to the advanced dairy
men; the great mass will have much to
learn before they reach this point. Too
many are careless about the feeding of
their COWS in fall. They think the sea-
son is past and that almost anything
will do them now. Having got through
with the factory season, they pay little
attention to the further yield of milk,
drying off their cows without any
thought of it's effect upon the next sea-
sons yield. They do not sufficiently
study the COW as milk producer, and
500 that secreting milk is made mat
ter of habit; that if a COW is well fed
and the flow of milk long kept up, this
habit will continue year after year UNI
til she becomes almost perpetual
milking machine. Many dairymen are
wont to extol the virtue of certain cows
that yield large flow of milk in the
flush of the season, taking little note of
how long this yield is kept up.
The value of cow depends much
more upon the length of the milking
season than upon the quantity of milk
given for few weeks. We have had
COWS that never gave more than twenty
five pounds of milk per day, and yet
gave more milk during the season than
others yielding even forty poundS at
the flush. The one class would average
twenty pounds per day for 800 days, or
5000 pounds per year; whilst the other
would average only twenty pounds per
day for 25O days, or 5000 pounds per
season. Now, the habit of holding out
the milk was fixed in the first class at
an early age, by good feeding through
the whole season and careful milking.
The second class had formed the habit
of drying off at about eight months;
and although yielding large amount
FOR few days, they soon fell below the
other class.
This habit of giving a pretty uniform
quantity of milk is Influenced very
much by the uniformity of feeding and
milking when the COW is young. If the
COW gets a generous diet only when the
grass is abundant and in very succu-
lent state, and no attempt is made to
give full ration when the grass is
short, she falls off in her milk so deci-
dedly and it continues so long as to be-
come permanent, and cannot be recov-
cred when grass again becomes abund-
ant. The most important qualification
in COW is to hold out her milk in a
generally uniform quantity. This, to a
great extent, is the result of proper
treatment when the COW is young. If
the heifer, with her first calf, is allowed
to dry off at eight months, she will be
very likely to do the same thing the
next season. But if the young cow is
to be established in a steady flow of
milk, she must be fed uniformly full
ration during the whole season.
When the grass becomes short or
dried, she must have other green food
or grain to make up the deficiency.
This extra food is the more important
as the weather becomes cold, in the
fall, and the grass becomes less nu-
tritious from touches of frost. Then
the dairyman must draw on his early
cut clover or late-sown corn. This be-
ing partly cured in shock, is sweet and
nutritious, and cows will eat it greedi-
| ly in the stable at night and morning.
If these are not sufficient to keep up
the full flow of milk for the season,
then small grain ration of corn-meal.
oats, middlings, or bran, should be
given also. Greater care should be
taken in milking, for the mixer should
be sure that every drop is drawn from
the udCler. The COW Yields her milk less