The Wisconsin tobacco reporter. (Edgerton, Wis.) 1877-1950, 1902-03-14
INCREASING BUTTER FAT.
The Kind of Feed Given Hasn't Any.
thing to Do With 1t.

thing to Do With 1t.
A correspondent writes to Dairy and
Creamery to ask how he can so feed
in butter-fa The old belief that COWS
will produce milk rich or poor in but
ter fat according to the feed they are
given has strong hold in this country
This belief led to the saying, Nothing
comes from cows teats that has not
gone into her mouth While this is
true in every sense of the word, long
continued and careful experiments
have proved that except within very
narrow bounds it is impossible to i'm
prove the quality Of the milk of cow
by feeding her.
The quality Of the milk is a charac-
teristic of the individual COW. She
gives milk that is rich or poor in butter
fat from some natural tendency which
is not we'll understood. This tendency
is transmittable to her descendants,
and by careful selection it is possible
to improve the average quality of the
milk from a herd Of COWS to wonder
full degree.
Given q COW that naturally gives
good milk-that rich in butter fat-and
that gives good milk. and the progeny
is likely to be better than the dam, al
though this is not invariably the case
Butter fat does not differ from tallow
in any essential way. it is animal fat
and is elaborated from the feed given
the COW that produced the milk from
which it is separated. One COW will
turn the fat in her feed to butter fat,
and another will store it up in her
body. The one cow will be a good but
ter maker and the other a poor one.
1t is now pretty generally conceded
that milk is elaborated largely during
the process of milking That it is sep
arated from the blood in some way is
certain. Feed cow more of the ele-
ments that go into the composition of
milk, and she will become fat. The COW
that gives poor milk will fatten much
easier than the one that gives rich
milk.
According to recent exhaustive eX-
periments made by Professor Hacker,
it does not make much difference what
is fed to cow if she is given plenti-
full supply Of sound feed. Give a cow
all she needs Of sound forage and
grain, and she will produce to the ut
most possible limit butter fat or tallow.
If she turns her feed into milk and but
ter fat. she is good COW. If she turns
it into tallow, she is a poor COW from
the dairyman's standpoint.
If our correspondent will follow this
plan, he will get more butter fat from
his COWS, but not richer milk. His COWS
will give more milk than they would if
poorly fed and every 100 pounds Of
that milk will contain just as much
butter fat as is natural for a given cow
to give. II she gives 3 per cent milk
and only 100 pounds a week, the milk
will contain three pounds of absolute
butter fat, or about three and half
pounds of butter. Feed her so she will
give double the quantity of milk, and
that milk will give double the quantity
Of butter fat, but will not be richer
than the smaller quantity. The way to
get more butter fat is to feed the COWS
better Just what it is best to feed
them is matter on which learned doc
tors disagree at this moment. HOwev-
err, it is safe to feed them enough, even
If the ration is not quite balanced.