Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1902-03-13
Continuous Winter Stablinu.

| Winter SIdDuQS Ol udlFN COWS. he
was never situated so as to keep the
COWS inside all winter. but is satisfied
that is the better method John
Gould, the veteran dairy authority,
| says a COW will get all the exercise
she needs from Thanksgiving to Eas-
ter by chewing her cud. The Plough
man hesitates to indOrse this, but
| thinks COWS get too much exercise.
when they are let out to drink icy
water at a trough and are obliged to
| stand. shivering like a fever-and-ague
patient, for half an hour. They ex-
ercised away the milk that our Gus
toners needed" The article con-
tinues: But we read of and have
seen some herds that are not let out
all during the winter, having the
water at the stalls, either to drink
| when they so desired or turned on for
| them at stated intervals. We like the
last plan best, as the water does not
get stale or filled with dust from the
rough fodder. Experiments have
| been made which showed no gain in
milk production from having water
constantly on hand.
Some of those herds have not only
kept the same cows thus tied up year
after year in the winter, and have
kept them healthy and in good condi-
ton, but have raised strong, vigorous
calves from them, and may be now
having the fourth or fifth generation
so kept and so raised from calfhood
up, and have had no more and per-
haps rather less disease among them
than those herds that have been given
fresh air and exercise out of doors
every day Those who have had to
do with thai dread disease, tubercu-
lOsis, have not reported that they
found it more prevalent or more,
severe among the herds that have
been kept continually stabbed than
among those that were out every day,
and in some test cases suspected
animals have recovered to all appear
ance when for isolation from the rest
Of the herd they were placed in a
separate warm stable and kept in
doors all winter.
Iu6SS were not given "1uS
box stalls in which to exercise, but
confined by stanchions or chains,
and got little more exercise than was
possible by side stepping, lying down
and getting up. The owners of such
herds feel it necessary to economic
on stable room almost as much as
the poorer farmers with small barns,
though they may give a little more
space behind and between the ami
mails than was allowed in the old
fashioned barns.
We believe in fresh air for man or
beast, but it is as easy to let the air
in where they are as to go out and
seek for it, and it is much easier to
regulate the quantity and its tempera-
ture inside than outside A north
east gale has more fresh air than we
feel to need some days, and those are
the days when it seems more import
ant to keep the fresh air out than to
let it in. But simple and not ex-
pensive ventilating arrangements now
enable one to admit fresh air and
carry away foul air and odors without
greatly changing the temperature or
letting any cold drafts enter directly
upon the animals as they stand or lie
down, the latter being most necessary
to avoid. as it is then the animal
temperature is the lowest.
The dairy COW or one of the dairy
type, bred to have thin skin and fed
to have a light coat of fine, soft hair,
is as sensitive to cold naturally as
healthy child that has been accus-
toned to be well clad and well shell
tered, and while she may have vi
tally enough to throw off it's effects
without serious injury, it must and
does reduce her capacity for produc-
ton of both milk and butter fat, and
it also creates the necessity for more
food to keep up the natural heat of
ne system. To use the concentrated
heating foods to warm the animal,
while the winds of winter are allowed
to chill her, is burning up corn as fuel
in a more wasteful way than the Kan
sas farmers did when they put it in
their stoves as costing less than
coal.
Perhaps there is a happy medium
between an enforced exposure each
day to the outside temperature in
winter. and an enforced confinement
| for six months, and VIE used to think
| that if we had a stable with the
modern improvements that allowed
us to feed and water in the stables
each time, and care for the animals
at comfortable temperature for them
and ourselves, we would still let them
/ out when the sun shone brightly and
| the air outside was above the freez-
| ing point. or even if little below it,
| if there was not wind to make it felt
too severely. But we have noticed
that those who tried that plan soon
made their days outside less frequent
and shorter. They did not find the
COWS taking the exercise hey were
thought to need. They would lie
down in the sun, but as often upon
cold, damp ground as elsewhere, and
| there were cases Of colds, garget
milk fever or abortion as a result. 1t
is not until the genial spring days.
when the grass begins to start, that
the cattle manifest much desire to
take exercise, or even that the sheep
and lambs begin to gambol and play
Before that time they march out as
! quietly as if going to a days labor
and though they may travel steadily
all day, it is not with the air OF
greatly enjoying it.
Of course the cows Of beef breeds
and especially those that have skin
&c +bicl- with hair almost &c thick