About the same time that his cow calved I repurchased mine. The feed of the two, thereafter, was very nearly alike, except that his cow had a feed of six quarts of meal per day, while mine had only two. His fat cow doubled on the quantity of milk that she had given the year before, when she came in poor, while my poor cow, with extra feed, fell short more than a third of her yield of the year before, when she came in, in good condition.
At that time I do not remember to have ever seen a work on chemistry, and knew nothing of its application; but the knowledge acquired, led to the formation of a theory in my mind, on which I have since acted, and which, I believe, has a scientific basis, to wit: “The fat laid on the body of an in-calf cow, is a store from which nature draws a large portion of the material which increases and enriches the subsequent flow of milk—a store from which she, by legitimate processes, produces oleo-stearine in the shape of butter.”
Acting upon this theory, I have endeavored to apportion to my cows a uniform daily ration, occasionally varying the material, which, although it may not sustain the cow in full flesh during the greatest flow of milk, seems to renew it during the period of the lesser flow, and render them in good condition at the time of calving. This system of uniform feeding, to my mind, pays better than it does to feed heavily while in milk, and then lightly when dry, because it furnishes a large resource of fat, on which to draw at a time when to consume sufficient food to sustain the entire flow of milk capable of being produced, might imperil health; and I feel quite sure that a certain richness is thereby imparted to the milk, that no amount of feeding will draw from a poor cow. In the autumn of 1877 I purchased a grade heifer reputed to be seven-eighths Jersey and one-eighth Ayrshire. She had dropped her first calf the spring previous, when only two years old. She was then represented as yielding three quarts of milk per day, and due to calve April the sixth. To account for the small yield of milk, her owner said she had been kept on poor pasture and milked by careless boys, who had not been particular to milk her clean.
That she had been kept on poor pasture her appearance abundantly confirmed. She came into my possession during the root harvest, in November. I commenced by feeding to her three bushels of rutabaga tops, or of beet tops, three pounds of corn meal, together with all the dry hay she would eat each day.
ONE YEAR’S EXPENSES AND RETURNS.
The cost of keeping the cow from November first, | ||||
| 150 | pounds | of Indian Meal, at $1.40 | $ 2.10 | |
| 380 | ” | Ship Stuff, at $1.35 | 5.13 | |
| 110 | ” | Oil Meal, at $1.30 | 1.82 | |
| 4140 | ” | Roots, at $8.00 per ton | 16.56 | |
| 3392 | ” | Hay, at $20 | 33.92 | |
| 1 | peck | Salt | 0.25 | |
| $59.78 | ||||
The cost from June first to November first, 1878, | ||||
| 1530 | pounds | of Hay, at $20 | $15.30 | |
| 225 | ” | Oil meal, at $1.30 | 2.92 | |
| 470 | ” | Bran, at $1.35 | 6.35 | |
| Salt | 0.25 | |||
| Service | 2.00 | |||
| $26.82 | ||||
| Making a total cost of | $86.60 | |||
for the year, counting nothing for the garden truck consumed during the summer and autumn. This, with the exception of the corn stalks, would have been consigned to the compost heap, had she not eaten it, so that its only value to me was its value for compost. But allowing that for the purpose of feed it was equal in value to its equivalent in hay, and that my winter ration of hay had been continued through the year, her total cost of keeping would have been, in round numbers, one hundred and four dollars.
In the roots fed to her during the winter, were included the waste and parings of vegetables used in a family of ten persons, which was sometimes no inconsiderable item. These were always thrown into the feed basket, and just enough fresh roots sliced to make the required weight. After the roots stored in the cellar were exhausted no account was made of this item. I make this statement simply to show that every item of feed was entered at its full value, into the cost of the keeping.
Now for the other side. Although the cow was quite thin when I bought her, yet under this system of care and feeding, she was estimated to have gained two hundred pounds in weight by the time she calved, on the fifteenth of April, 1878, and of this weight she had not lost more than seventy-five pounds at the end of the year, November first. When I bought her she was represented as yielding three quarts of milk per day. Her yield of milk weighed on the first day exactly five and three-quarter pounds. At the end of three weeks, it had increased to eleven pounds per day, and continued at this figure with scarcely any interruption until the first of February. It then rapidly fell off, until by the twenty-fifth of that month, she yielded only seven pounds per day. I then commenced milking her once a day, and the milking on the fourth day after weighed only four and a half pounds. I continued milking her until the fifteenth of March, when I stopped, the weight of the last milking being only one and three-quarter pounds. On the tenth or April she calved. I let her calf suckle her until it was four weeks old, when it was sold for veal. On the seventh of May her yield of milk was twenty-two pounds. It averaged about that figure until she got a full feed of pea vines in June, when it ran up as high as twenty-seven pounds. In July it fell off some, and continued to run from twenty to twenty-three pounds until the middle of August. It then gradually diminished to the first of November, at which time she was yielding thirteen pounds of milk per day. I find, by referring to my diary, that her total yield of milk from the time I purchased her until she calved, was one thousand and sixty-seven pounds, equal to four hundred and eighty-four quarts, reckoning thirty-four ounces to the quart. Milk was then selling, in this vicinity, at six cents per quart, making a value of twenty-six dollars and four cents.
From the time she calved until the first of November, her total yield of milk was three thousand seven hundred and seventy-seven pounds, equal to one thousand seven hundred and seventy-seven quarts, at five cents, eighty-eight dollars and eighty-five cents; sale of calf, six dollars and fifty-cents; making a net profit of seventeen dollars and thirty-nine cents, to say nothing of the growth of the cow, or the value of her manure, which was an ample compensation for the care of keeping.