The great West. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1889-18??, 1891-12-18
FARM AND HOUSEHOLD.
IMPROVING THE DAIRY BY A
SIMPLE MEANS.
Wedding Casyes-Navy Beans Neglected
but Profitable Cro2-Productive
Eoil-Farm Notes and Do
mest.c Helps.
Cows

1t Is not my purpose at this time to
write an article on the ideal dairy
cow. But we are going to see how
we can improve. our dairy with the
material at hand. We should know
very nearly what each Individual COW
can do for us. and any COW that will
not make us 10 lbs. of butter a week,
six months Of the year, and still pay
her keep three months longer should
be discarded-eit sent to the sham
bles or sold on her merits.
We should breed our best cows to
an animal coming from butter
family. When butter is our object it
is utter folly to breed to a Shorthorn,
or any of the Leef breeds. just as
much as to use Clydesdale or Per-
cheron. when you want an animal for
speed. or the road. Keep the heiter
calves from these COWS, and in turn
breed them to the same kind of an
animal. BY this means your herd
will gradually improve, and while you
are waiting for this improvement l do
not think you will loose anything by
purchasing one or two good, well-bred
COWS.
AS to which breed is preferable 1
do not consider myself an impartial
judge, as we have never tried any of
the butter breeds but the Jerseys and
of course we are awfully in love with
them. Mr.. Talcott seems to prefer
the Guernseys and the little Attorney
also has its friends; so each one must
make choice for himself. But at any
rate, let us do away with those COWS
that only make four or five pounds
of butter week. 1t is just as much
trouble to care for a poor cow as a good
one, and the cow that makes the least
butter is not always the one that eats
the least
Right well do I remember the COWS
we began making butter with. Beau
ties they were, of their kind, and thor
oughbreds in the bargain. ct is need
less to say they did not belong to a
butter breed.) Great foaming buckets
OF milk they gave. fully twice the
quantity we get from any COW we have
now. But alas! only about one third
the amount of butter materialized,
when we came to the churn, that we
get from the COWS we have now.
Right here we want to say a word
about feeding those choice calves that
are to build up our herd. We think
it best for the COW, and decidedly
best for the calf to let the latter re-
main with the COW at least three days.
do not wish you to understand me to
advocate letting the calf have all the
milk for this length of time. Take all
you can get twice day; the calf will
be sure to get enough. When you
take the calf away, the better way is
to have them in the stable and quietly
drive the cow out; letting the calf re-
main, so she does not see you take it
from her. Keep it where she can
neither see nor hear it if possible.
Leave it alone for twelve hours. Offer
it some milk, warm from the
COW. 1t will generally suck
the finger. and about the
next feed it should drink alone You
should not feed it fresh milk right
along. Give one half skinned sweet
milk until two weeks old, when it will
make a better animal for the purpose
you are raising it. if fed sweet
skinned milk with the addition of a
very little oil meal or wheat bran,
better, in fact than if fed on whole
milk. This manner of feeding will
give growthy calf of large eating Ca
pacity, which is very desirable in a
cow. We all know that the more a
cow eats the more butter she will
make. She needs certain amount
to supply her body, and all over and
above that she puts into the bucket.
Feed a calf on fresh milk and very rich
feed. and it will get in to the habit of
laying on flesh and it will be hard to
get rid of this characteristic in the
COW. 1t is safe rule to discard any
COW that gets fat while in full flow of
milk. You may be certain that her
milk is deficient in butter fats M. j.
K. in the Ohio Farmer
Navy Beans a Profitab Crop.
This is crop that is neglected in
y -