The Milan exchange. (Milan, Gibson County, Tenn.) 1874-1978, 1886-06-12
MILK OR BUTTER.
Points to be Considered by Every Farmer
and Dairyman.

and Dairyman.
Every man who enters into the dairy
business must determine for himself
which branch he will follow, and will
probably settle the question according
to his surroundings. As a rule, far
mers are very fond of following the
same occupation as their neighbols,
and usually there are but few butter
makers in sections where milk is made
to sell in cities, and few sellers of milk
where the custom is to make butter.
AT the same time, it is not always adj
visable to run in the same grooves with
your neighbors.
There is much to be said in favor of
milk-selling. There is nothing but the
raw material to be made and shipped,
requiring but few utensils and little
skill beyond feeding the cows judi
ciously, but for this very reason the oc-
cupation is always crowded. Men who
can do nothing else can feed and milk
COWS and haul the milk to the railroad
station; but as railroads mu tiply, these
producers of milk also multiply, until
now we hear of starvation prices for
milk in the neighborhood of all large
cities.
With butter-making in addition to
producing the raw material, the dairy
man becomes manufacturer; and while
it is true that he may remain for all
time only able to produce the crudest
possible article, yet the possibilities are
all open to him of reaching the highest
standards and reaping the largest
profits. No matter what his surround
ings, or where he may be located, if he
has the right material in his own brain
and heart, there are even possibilities of
national reputation open to him. AS
the progressive step is taken from being a
producer only of the raw material to that
of manufacturer, there must, of course,
be additional responsibility and greater
skill at command of the successful but
ter-maker. AS he rises in the scale, the
number of his competitors becomes less
and less, until he feels utter loneliness
when he reaches the summit of his
fame.
1t has been figured out that while it
costs ga cents on dollars worth of
| butter for transportation, it costs 13 tx
cents on a dollars worth of milk fo1
| transportation. These are, of course,
only relative figures, governed by a
mans immediate surroundings, but
they give some dea of the difference in
cost of delivering the two articles.
While butter may be sent any distance,
provided it is well packed and properly
made, milk transportation must be always
! limited until some more convenient and
economical method of handling it than
the present is invented.
SO far as the drain upon the farm is
concerned, the philosophers all decide
in favor of butter, claiming that the
man who sells milk sells his farm, all Of
which is probably more a matter o
theory than practical fact Any farm
will run down and out if not properly
taken care of, and with intelligent man
agement any farm will retain its fertility
without regard to the amount of mill
sold off it. 1t has been proven in Eu
rope that a well-set pasture on good
strong land will last several hundreds
of years, though it supplied grass TO
dairy herds and beef cattle promiscu
ously; and that ought to satisfy III,
average dairyman, for in this countr,
: men and their children seldom hold t.
one calling beyond the second genera
, ton.
e The main virtue, however, in butter
d making with the average dairyman i
5 that it leaves the skim-milk and butter
e milk on the farm to be fed to pigs
S calves, chickens, and even back to tn
o cows, The least enthusiastic rate thes
b by-products of the butter dairy at twer
Il ty-iive cents per hundred pounds, whic
d is probably little more than half the
value when judiciously fed. Wheneve
d you see butter-maker getting rich
n you may be sure he is a wise man in tn
n use of his skim-milk and butter-mill
}. and with the modern methods of dee
= cold setting and use of the centrifug,
n ma CHR es this skim-mlk is still nor
d valuable than it was few years ag,
it The successful dairyman makes ever
Is edge cut, and is never above turning I
o profit the sO-called waste products 4,
- the dairy.-AInericau D1iry,131U