The Fargo forum and daily republican. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1894-1957, 1911-01-19

That the Mechanical COW mixer is
success is the contention Of ]. o.
Perkins of Devils Lake. Mr.. Perkins
paper was read at today's session of
the tri-state convention. He was un-
able to be present,
His paper was as follows: You ask, Is
the mechanical cow mixer a success?
will answer that question by asking
one. Is the cream separator a sue
cess? Now the cow-milker takes the
same place I'm the large dairies that
the cream separator takes. The cream
separator allows larger diaries to be
operated on the farm. by separating
the milk as soon as II is drawn from
the cow, allowing the dairymen to have
the warm separated milk to feed to
his young stock and also allows him
to keep his cream in a smaller place
and to have 1t cool to take to the
creamery.
He gets more cream with less work
than he did with the old fashioned way
Of setting the milk in cans and taking
the whole product to the creamery.
The milking machine allows the
dairyman to milk more cows with less
help than all hand milking, so you can
see he is in the same position, "more
cream and less work" The average
daryman is not going to be interested
in the milking machine unless he has
more milking than he can do himself
and then he begins to look around for
some assistance. We tried the profess
sional mixers, but that did not work
for we were too far from the town, 1t
was too lonesome here for them, then
we tried putting the farm hands 20
milking, by making the month men
milk, this did not work satisfactorily,
some were slow about getting out in
the morning, or in other words tried
to shirk ali they possibly could so that
we lost a great deal OF time. We had
then about made up our minds to
abandon the dairy, as every year made
it harder to get help to milk the COWS.
Then we began to hear of the mechani-
cal mixer but could not find out
much about 1t. We wrote to the lead
ing dairy paper Of the northwest for
information. The editor said there was
such a machine on the market, but
he could not recommend ii. He did
not consider it practical. then wrote
to a dairy commissioner Of an eastern
state, having learned that he had one
installed. He informed me that he
had his in operation about six months,
but he neither recommended nor con-
demned It. He told me that he was
not prepared TO say anything about 1t
until he would have IL installed year,
SO you see / was not getting ahead
very fast in my inquiries. Later on,
in round about way, / learned there
was one in operation in southern Min
nesota, and succeeded in getting the
mans name and opened up correspond
ence with him and learned his machine
had been installed about four months.
finally decided to make trip down
there for / was determined to see the
machine in operation in the average
dairyman's hands, as / did not like to
take the agents word. / arrived in
due time and went out to the mans
place at o'clock in the morning. /
was determined to catch him in the
act. I found the machine installed in
a very crude manner. He seemed to
think a great deal more Of his engine
than he did of the milking machine,
but ii MIXED the cows and that was
what ] wanted to see II do. / was
satisfied If the machine would work
under those conditions there that It
would work installed in workmanlike
manner.
Now take the cream separator, to
get the proper results you must have
the right speed to your machine. Your
machine must sit level, and if the bowl
gets out OF balance it must be ball
anced up or, in other words, run it
according to the directions from the
factory. The same thing applies to
the milking machine. You must install
it according to the directions that come
with the machine. Take a piece of
machinery that you are going to run
an hour and a half twice a day, year
in and year out you must have it
right and keep 1t right.
Now / notice from what I read the
milking machine Is not considered
practical in many places. / notice in
the dairy papers frequently where
some one is offering a milking ma
chine for sale at a ridlculously low
price. / noticed one offered the other
day, the four mixers, vacuum pump,
pipes, everything complete for 500.
OF course, the reason for this / do not
know. 1t might be that he had a good
reason for the sale. / have often