Gloucester County Democrat. (Woodbury, N.J.) 1878-1932, 1898-05-05
HARDPAN.
Hard Common Sense and Bottom Facts
For Creamery Patrons.

Hard Common Sense and Bottom Facts
For Creamery Patrons.
In times of low prices for butter there
is always more or less discomfort among
the patrons of creameries. This is nat
ural enough. But the amazing thing
about it is that not one in a hundred is
willing to look at home for the reason
of low profit or no profit at all. In many
portions of the west the patrons lay
the blame all to the proprietary cream
cry. They say they want change to
the cooperative system, and at it they
go. But nowhere scarcely do we hear Of
any sharp analytical discussion on their
own farm methods. No one gets up in
these cooperative meetings and talks
like this for instance: Men and breth-
rem, have been studying up on the
kind of COWS we have and the amount
of intelligence we are putting into this
dairy business, and I tell you no man
ought to expect anything but straight
out loss if be does as we are doing.
''We are all the time looking at the
creamery end of the business, instead of
the farm end. If the creamery made our
butter for nothing, and the railroads
transported it to market free, then even
we could not make cent on such poor
COWS and poor returns as we get from
them.
''The trouble all liesat our own farm
end. We have been tackli lg business
that calls for No. l good sense and un-
Outstanding, and No. good COWS to get
any profit out of it, when the Lord
knows we haven t either.
"How in the name of common sense
can we expect the creamery to make any
money out Of such folly. We are doing
nothing to educate ourselves, to better
our Judgment, and our cows are no bet
ter, if indeed they are as good, as they
were years ago.
"We are taking hold of this question
at the wrong end. Let US 60 vigorously
to work to get better and more correct
ideas about COW management and do
something at once to secure COWS that
more than pay their keeping in this time
of low prices. :"
Such talk as that in a creamery meet
ing would be nightly in order every
wbers, but thousands of COW owners are
SO blind they can't see it. Let us see
for moment just what such kind of
dairy farming, with the everlasting
general purpose COW" amounts to.
During the past year the Strawberry
Point creamery in Iowa made 515, 665
pounds Of butter, which Melted the pa
irons SCI, 586.42. Divide the dollars by
the pounds and we find the patrons re-
ceived net II. 8 cents pound for their
butter, and their skimmilk back. Call
it 10 cents pound for the sake of easy
reckoning.
Now, suppose those Strawberry Point
COWS are just about what the average
COW is in Iowa, producing only from
$50 to 175 pounds of butter in year.
What sort of reward are those farmers
who stick by that kind of COW going
to get for their year s work? Seventeen
dollars and fifty cents worth of butter
and the skimmilk and calf in return
for all the food and labor expended on
such COWS for year.
The trouble at Strawberry Point and
all over the country is this low average
general purpose COW.
Farmers go into the business blinded
by lot of old, wornout notions that
don't fit these days. If the trotting
horse men insisted on going ON to the
track with lot of draft bred horses and
banking their money on such animals,
they would be in like fix But the
horsemen can't be led into such folly.
But the mischief is we cannot get
these general purpose farmers to stop
and think or read. They are still of the
opinion that beefy COWS and no reading
or study will win money out of the
dairy business. How much longer must
they strike blindly right and left before
they see where the truth lies. How diff
ferent it is with the man who has ac-
oepted dairy truth for his guide and does
business with dairy COW yielding from
275 to 800 pounds of butter year.
Hoard's Dairyman.