The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1881-09-03
Effect Of Food Upon Milk.

Every dairyman has learned by ex-
perience that when the feed falls off in
quantity or quality the quantity and
quality of the milk keeps pace with it.
But they do not sufficiently consider,
perhaps, the fact that the character of
the grass has much to do with the quail
ity of the milk and the cheese or butter
made from it. The following remarks,
taken from the Country Gentleman,
bear interesting relation to this subjects:
1.-The observations of Dumas, Payen
and Boussingault have shown the fact
that COW gives healthy milk in exact
proportion to the surplus of food beyond
what is necessary for her own mainte-
nance. If the animal is kept ON food
barely sufficient for proper nourishment
the milk produced must be at loss of
animal tissue, with general deterioration
of the milk and also of the cow. Milk
formed at an expense of the nutriments
and tissues of the body has less caseine.
butter, sugar and salts, while the albu-
men will be increased. 1t follows that
the value of milk must depend upon the
excess of food beyond what is required
by nature to keep up the normal vigor
of the body. Decaisne demonstrated by
experiments during the siege of Paris
in 1871, in forty-three cases of nursing
women, that insufficient or non-nutri-
tious food produces diminution in the
normal quality of the milk; also vari-
alton of its chemical constituents, such
as an increase of albumen and diminu-
ton of caseine, butter and sugar. The
proportion of albumen in such cases is
generally in inverse ratio to that of
caseine. Such milk rapidly decomposes;
and this will explain why in hot wealth
er, if mingled with good milk, it would
induce ferments and cause serious
trouble to the cheese-maker.
"That the quality of grasses is great
ly Influenced by soil and situation. has
been generally observed by farmers
who have been in the practice of fatten-
ing stock for the SHAMELESS. Upon GER
tain pastures cattle fatten rapidly and
without trouble, while upon other lands
they do not readily take on flesh, though
the growth of grasses seems abundant
and of varieties accounted nutritious.
1t is not surprising that cheese-makers
often have trouble in handling milk
when going from one locality to another,
for in addition to the more common
causes of bad milk, such as uncleanli-
ness in milking, bad water, abuse of
COWS by beating and overdriving, there
is still another, affecting milk-that of
soil or the food which it produces.
Generally on high and dry pastures of
grayelly loan the milk will be more
readily converted into cheese than when
the milk is produced on low wet grounds.
The treatment of milk and curds, there
fore, must be varied to meet the differ
emit characters of soils, for that manipu-
lation which would make good cheese
in one locality might make bad cheese
in another. IHtr ,7vlt
sit has been said that good dairy
products can be made over q vast ex-
tent of country, and almost in any Sec
ton where there is suitable climate,
and the extension of dairying over the
West and Northwest is cited in proof
that soil has little or no influence in the
production of the finer qualities of dairy
goods. This is undoubtedly true if
pasturage supplemented with ground
Grain, corn-meal, ship-stuffs, and the
ike; but if cows are to, be kept wholly
on grass during summer, as is common
in the best dairy districts of the East,
the truth of the statement may well be
doubted. The fine butter and cheese
that come from Iowa and other parts of
the West are not due wholly to the ex-
ceHence of Western grasses, but to the
full supply of ground grain which the
COWS get as supplement- to their past
uraee in summer. The success OF win
ter dairying depends upon the feeding
of meal, bran, shipstuffs, or the like as
supplement- to good hay, for hay alone,
as ordinarily fed, does not make gilt
edged product :. 49, n - ffH.
IL IL LII nntnhos tho hinnaat