The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1892-05-14
OLD AND NEW DAIRYlNG.
Changes All Along the Line and Always
for the Better

Changes All Along the Line anu Always
for the Better
In the sixties cheese was double in
price what it brings now, ana makers
who knew little about the business Of
manufacturing readily COMMANDED sew
enty-five dollars per month. Many of
such fellows could not get place in a
factory today except as second hands,
and at only commonlab wages at that.
The cheese that they turned out, al
though it contained some good stock,
was the reverse of uniform in quality,
and would now be scowled at by deal
ers, and would bring cut prices.
Yet dairymen rightly claim that they
received more for their milk then than
now. True, they did per pound, but
have they not learned in twenty years
Of dairy investigation and advancement
to decrease the number of tactical pounds
yielded by their diaries? Also, does not
dollar go farther now in purchasing
necessaries than it did then? With
cheese bringing sixteen cents per pound
In 1870 dairynen were really but little
more benefited than they We're last sum-
mer, when cheese was selling at eight.
Everything was then high, both what
the farmer had to buy as well as what
he had to sell. These prices were not
healthy; in other words, they were be-
yond the value of the necessaries to
which they were attached. Present day
dairymen, who have for the last few
years paid some attention to breeding
good mich stock, and have fed on the
same plan, are now making more clear
money per COW than they did a quarter
of century ago. when dairy products
were so high.
The purchasing power OF money is so
much greater than it was then, the
knowledge of breeding so much more
clearly defined, and the adoption as
commissary OF that modern dairy won
der, the silo, SO efficacious, that dairying
just now is standing on a very firm
foundation.
In butter, also, refined skill has done
SO much toward improving its quality
that prices for choice grades in current
market reports duplicate quotations a
score of years ago, when a dollar had to
be paid for what half dollar will cover
now. The improved methods of asso-
ciated manufacture of both butter and
cheese Row in vogue directly or indi-
rectly benefits every dairyman in the
land. Even if the average price Of
cheese has slowly decreased in the face
of improvement in its manufacture, the
falling off in value was inevitable, and
nothing could have prevented its going
even lower but for its improved quality.
A few years ago the necessity Of aerat-
ing milk to expel inherent odors, and at
the same time to reduce its temperature,
was not appreciated or thought of. For
cheese or butter making purposes the
main idea was to chill the milk with ice
OF cold spring water. In cheese facto-
ries the result was great prevalence of
floating and tainted curds arising from
the very mode taken to prevent them.
Butter made from sweet cream was
also something nearly unheard of, and
there was more cream that staid on
milk until the.latter was loppered than
there was Skinned in an unripened
stage. The marked improvements COW
ering all the departments of the dairy
of late years have been of material value
to every person owning and milking a
cow.--George E. Newell in American
Cultiyator-