The ranch. [volume] (Seattle, Wash.) 1902-1914, 1909-02-01
COMMON SENSE NEEDED.


An editorial writer in a city daily made this
glarng statement: Buffers trick of vanishing
is due to excessive moisture. An INSCRIPTIONS
dealer can put out butter of which 30 per cent is
water
That is a physical impossibility. Mr.. D.
White in charge of the section of dairy manu-
features of the United States Department of Agri-
culture reported that during 1908 reports were
received from 2016 creamerieS; that the quantity
CT butter exceeds the amount of buttertat In the
because of water casein salt, etc. This.
excess is termed overrun,' and normally amounts
to 1919 per cent" Prof Fred. Rasmussen OF the
New Hampshire Agricultural College says:
Chemical analysis shows that the water content
of butter may vary from to 20 per cent Ex-
periments at Purdue University Ind showed that
"butter made in spring and early summer con-
tains more moisture than fall and winter butter.
Butter analyses showed an increase in per cent
of soft fats and a decrease in per cent OF hard
fats toward spring and early summer The soft
fats upon hardening will contain about twice as
much moisture the hard fats
When larger amount of water is mixed with
the butter fat than will affiliate it the but
ter becomes ''leaky,' it will drip and will not
retain the moisture, so that 20 per cent OF moist
ure is an abnormal proportion to be found in any
butter Inasmuch as excessive moisture affords a
medium for the deleteriOus forms of bacteria to
get in their pernicious work in rendering the but
ter rancid the amount of moisture allowed in but
ter has been wisely limited by the Department
of Agriculture for it's inspectors at 16 per cent,
and here and there creamery has been fined
contains so per cent of moisture.
Such statements circulated among readers who
constitute the consuming classes for dairy prod
ucts not only do those consumers no good, but
tend to do only harm to the butter producers,
whether on the farm in the factory They are
akin to the statements put forth by ignorant and
self important health officers in their vicious
efforts to the destruction of dairy herds at
their sole dctum because of tuberculosis, regard
less of facts concerning that ailment.
Dr. Robert Koch, the German scientist who
discovered the tubercle bacillus holds that bovine
and human tuberculosis are two different diseases
and not transmissible from to the other. He
tried several months to inoculate cattle with hui
tuberculosis, but could not. Dr. Koch has
been given fund of 100000 (one-half by Andrew
Carnegie) to continue his tuberculosis lnvestiga-
tons.
Dr. V. A. Moore, director of the Veterinary
School of Cornell University, asserts that only 40
per cent of the glanduar form of tuberculosis in
human beingS-which rarely occurs among adults
is caused by bovine bac and that glandular
tuberculosis constitutes but One-twelfth of the
cases of tuberculosis while pulmonary tubercu-
losis constitutes eleventwelfths and is never
caused by bovine bacilli. DR.. TheObald Smith of
Boston says that the chief of human in
lection is the coughing consumption" and that
at present there is evidence that bovine bacilli
may be transformed and assume the human type
in the human body.
Prof. Bernhard Bang, the Danish scientist, holds
that tuberculosis is spread only by contagion-
not by heredity-and the Bang" system of eradi-
cation of the disease is based on solaton-not
on destruction-of the affected animals, together
with cleanliness, light and thorough ventilation.
The demand of the Inland Empire Breeders AS
ISOLATION that when livestock is killed by order
of the officials for contagious disease, the owners
should receive a recompense from public funds
is just and right and will tend to limit needless
destruction of herds at the dctatOn of rresponsi-
BILE officials Let us have clean milk and pure
butter but let us have clean and honorable meth
DDS of attaining this result. Let us have COM
mon sense rather than cenfscation.
The various livestock associations that have
held recent meetings are united upon a demand
for more rapid and continuous movement of the
railroad trains that transport livestock. This re-