The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1904-06-14
Live Stock and Dairy
CONDUCTED BY CHARLES wM.
Professor OF Agriculture, N. @. A. q M. College, and Agri-
culturtst North Carolina Experiment Station.
Inquiries Of Progressive Farmer readers cheerfuly an
Bwered.
what I Have Accomplished With ny COWS.

(synopsis OF speech delivered by MI. L. N. Virgins be-
fore the Illinois Dairyman's Association, held in January
last and reported especially for The Progressive Farmer)
By investigation, I found that the forty cows
that we were milking did not yield satisfactory
returns as compared with the reports of other
herds. I found that I could not tell what a par
ticular COW was yielding, and therefore did not
know which of my COWS were profitable and
which were improbable. On the first of March,
1902, / had my COWS numbered and began using
a Babcock Tester. We saved complete tests for
a week. From Mr.. III. B. Curriers' american
Dairying' / had gathered some information on
testing milk, and so went at it with a good deal
of awe and against big odds. The foreman of the
farm who had been employed by my father for a
great many years, and five other employees, could
not stand the idea of weighing and testing the
milk; only two of the farm crew of eight stood
by me. During the month of March, 1902, the
forty COWS which were in all stages of lactation,
most of them fresh in the early fall and winter
averaged 1894 pounds of milk; average test AZ
per cent; average pounds of butter fat, nineteen
ponds. Figuring as Mr.. Gurler had
ed, / estimated that the average yield for the herd
for g year, or 8.4 months, would be 3,459 pounds
of milk, 169 pounds of butter fat, and increasing
by one-eighth they would yield 179 pounds of but
ter.
Our feed was costing us about twenty-three
cents per day for each COW. The forty COWS were
averaging about two gallons of milk per day.
You see our milk was costing us to produce it
about eleven cents per gallon, besides the cost of
labor, which amounted to about seven cents per
cow per day. Our eyes were being opened. We
bought two young registered Red Poll bulls from
predominant milk and butter strains, the very
best individual we could buy, regardless of price.
IL - ---
heifers came in fresh and we bought any frst-class
COWS we could find. By careful study of the in
dividual records of the COWS, and weighing the
feed four times a month to each COW, we were
able to cut expenses and increase milk produc-
ton. / had studied out n%utritive ratios and found
ours had been about 20. We gradually brought
it to 1853. We have had best results from a 1:6
ratio, varied according to the rice of the feed
and working conditions of the COWS.
Last March, one year from the time we started
to weigh and test, we MIXED forty-nine cows.
The average amount of milk produced for the
month of March, 1908, was 1908 pounds, an in
crease over March, 1902, of $500 pounds. The
average test was 4.O4 per cent, Is per cent lower
than the year before, but the average pounds of
butter fat produced was 252 pounds, or about 282
pounds of butter. In short, we had increased the
milk production from 3,459 pounds per COW to g.
219 pounds per COW, or an increase of 2,756 pounds
per COW. The butter fat increased from 159
pounds to 252 pounds, an increase of ninety-three
pounds per cow, and instead of forty COWS produc-
ing an average of 179 pounds of butter, we had
forty-nine COWS which averaged 283 pounds, allow
ing one-eighth for increase in churning.
Our feed for March, 1908, cost us on an average
of nineteen cents per day per COW, with a ratio of
1 :5.8, several cents higher than it had been in the
winter months. The average cost of production