Ashtabula weekly telegraph. (Ashtabula, Ohio) 1880-1886, 1880-12-17
Winter Butter.

L. IN A1AA AAAADA VIM has q hhAhbGA VI
COWS and intends to make butter
through the winter should in justice to
himself, to say nothing Of justice to the
consumer, make preparations to make
good butter. He already has his COWS
and no advice upon selection of the ami
NAL need be given. 1t is in order,
however, to suggest that it is poor
policy to keep poor COWS through the
winter. If you have one, two or a
dozen animals in your herd, which
have not shown good milking qualities,
get rid of them, get rid of them! The
shambles are the place for such COWS;
and it is high time that a decision as to
what cows you are going to keep, and as
to those you are not going to keep, was
made. But the food question is peril
nent and important. You have plenty
of good hay, of course. If not, one Of
two things remains to be done and it is
unnecessary to question the policy of
the suggestion; either buy hay or give
up the idea of meeting with the best
success in winter dairying. Indeed,
unless you have hay Of fine quality and
in good quantity, it would be wisdom
to dispose of your COWS. But it must
not be forgotten that hay alone, or hay
and grain is not all that
COW needs. That used to be
the way COWS were kept. In fact,
they had nothing but hay, and if any
body or anything in this world were
as they watched the growing of grass
in the spring time. Every dairyman
should have good supply Of roots, and
it is not difficult to secure this, even if
we have been negligent in growing
them. Mangels, beets and carrots are
not so dear that it will seriously cripple
any of US financially to lay in stock.
We do not know which is the best root
for feeding dairy cattle, or rather we
do not feel like advising, for each has
its firm advocates. 1t is safe to say,
however, that any of them are good
enough We should not advise feeding
turnips, although we do believe that
there is good deal of nonsense about
detecting the taste of turnips at all times
in butter when the COW has been fed on
them. That it is often, and perhaps
generally detected, there is no doubt
But we know of men who have fed
turnips all their lives, and there is no
more of a turnipy taste to their butter
than there would be to butter from a
COW that never was within a thousand
miles of turnip. But there is a secret
in growing or feeding in such cases,
which we do not all possess, and, there
fore, it is best to let them alone and
feed something else. Remembering, in
addition to what has been suggested,
the matter of sailing the COW, and so
so far we are right.
Then comes the matter of facilities for
making the butter. Is the milk room
specially a milk room, or is it cellar,
in which there is everything else, from
rotten potatoes to fragrant fruitP If
the latter the butter will be as fertile of
flavor as a magioian's apartment bottle
is of liquids. Good butter cannot be
made under such conditions and it is
all nonsense to suppose otherwise. II
g single reader is situated in this unfor-
tunate way make a change at once.
Have q milk room that will be a milk
room and not a compost heap. Keep
the milk in one place the rotten potatoes
in another, ana do not let bad faVors of
any kind reach the milk, cream or but
ter. II that advice is followed you will
have good butter.
Having obtained this result remember
our oft-repeated injunctions to please
the eye. People like nice yellow but
ter much better than they like white
butter, although it may be just as fine
in quality. Don't be afraid, therefore,
to use artificial eolOring. 1t is easily
prepared, or can be had already pre-
pared, and when properly added to the
butter it increases its value and makes
1t really moro palatable, although the
latter depends upon the imagination.
Then send your butter TO market neatly
packed and you will be satisfied with
yourself and the winter dairy. Western
| Rural. rs....r.t. H.