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Show BUILDING UP A HERD Robber Cows Should Be Disposed of When Discovered. Cheapest Way to Insure Profits Is to Use Common Sense and Good Judgment In Selection of Sire Tester Is Infallible. (By R. G. WEATHERSTONE.) With butter selling to the city customer cus-tomer at 40' cents a pound, and the price of feed for dairy cows soaring upward every month, the question of the robber cow becomes more interesting interest-ing every day. How any man can go along feeding a lot of scrub cows that cost more than they earn is beyond comprehension. If you have ten cows and the tester shows four of them do not produce enough milk to pay for their keep, why not sell them and put the proceeds into one good cow one that will not only save the loss of the robber cows, but earn a net profit of from $30 to $50 a year? That is good business sense, isn't it? Here are some championship milk and butterfat records that you may want to refer to some time when you want to know the possibilities of milk and butter production: Jacoba Irene, Jersey cow, made a record of 15,503 pounds of milk testing 5.5 per cent, butterfat, 8,539 pounds; Reua Ross, Ayreshire cow, 15,072 pounds of milk, testing 4.2G per cent, butterfat, equaling equal-ing 6,432 pounds in a year; Holstein cow, Colantha Fourth's Johanna, 27,432.5 pounds of milk, testing 3.64 per cent, butterfat, equal to 998.26 pounds in a year; Yeksa Sunbeam, Guernsey cow, 14,920.8 pounds of milk, testing 5.74 per cent, butterfat, equal to 857.15 pounds in a year. In sompHting the butter yield, add 15 per :ent. to the butterfat records. These are possible yields under the best conditions con-ditions by something less than one cow in a million. Of course, we cannot all own such cows as these, but we can buy an occasional oc-casional bull calf from these strains and by crossing him with good grade cows build up a milk profit herd-and never miss the cost. The universal A Typical Robber Cow. profits from good cows secured in this way will pay for a good bull in a short time. This is the cheapest way of building up a herd and there can be no failing if common sense and good judgment are used as to the selection se-lection of the bull. The Babcock tester will keep us straight on the value of the cows, because they cannot can-not dodge the test. It is infallible, and the poor cow that brings down the average of the herd cannot hide her shortcomings. The tester shows her up every time. |