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Show DftJRYl N G THE SCORE-CARD SYSTEM OF DAIRY INSPECTION. Modern investigations in dairy sanitation sani-tation have shown the importance of producing and handling milk under clean conditions, and a significant factor in attaining that result is the score-card system, of daio' inspection, inspect-ion, according to Messrs. Clarence B. Lane and George M. Whitakcr in a report just pub'ished by the Bureau of Animal Industry of the United States Department of Agriculture. Agri-culture. The main advantage that tluy attribute to the score-card sys-U-ii is that it deals with itemized conditions. City milk inspection a f.u years ago was merely a matter of detecting added water or prescr-ai prescr-ai vcs. With recent progress in Mii'tary science the work has broadened, broad-ened, and boards of health arc now investigating the sanitary phases of milk production, transportation and dslribution. Tn the smaller citjes most of the milk consumed is retailed by the producer, pro-ducer, and even in places of considerable consid-erable iha, many producers arc also retailers. In cases u'hqrc the funct-' funct-' ions of producer nd rctailcjr are merged in one person Nan inspection of the dairy farm disc'osW (lie methods meth-ods of distribution as well as pro-duetion, pro-duetion, and the dairy farm score-card score-card answers all purposes under stub conditioner As cities gnow, middlemen become a necessity and their places of busi- t nc.s are more familiarly known as "plants." 'Obese plants have wide range of capacity, equipment, and methods. Onccxtrcmc is a- building 300 to Oo feet long on a spur of a rnilrcmd where milk is received by the train load, cooled, mixed, filtered, filter-ed, perhaps pasteurized, canned or bottled, and he'd in cold storage until un-til retailed in the cily. The other extreme is the dealer retailing only a few gallons who may have no plant and his equipment consists of only a carrier can and a quart measure 1 which were washed m the kitchen J hink.with the family dishes; or he may jj have fitted up the dork, illy ventilated basement of his residence as a "milk pl.mt" with a wooden tank for cooling cool-ing the milk, a few dozen bott'es, a wafditub in which to cleanse them, a dipper for filling, and a brush to agitate lukewarm water inside the bottles. .It docs not necessarily follow fol-low that all small dealers adopt improper im-proper practices, but the chances arc that the ordinary milkman with small capital and onfy a little at stake will take as much care as a person differently dif-ferently situated. For the past two years the Bureau of Animal Industry through its dairy division has been making a study of dairy inspection with a view to developing n system that would be 1 radical and comprehensive, and has assisted the authorities of a number of cities in different sections of the country in applying such methods for the improvement of their milk sup-1 sup-1 lies. Some results of this work, together to-gether with instructions for using the score-card system, arc given in the judication referred to, which may be had by addressing a request to the A Bureau at Vnsliinjft5n D- G., fox. yK Circular I30 . . '- A' Striking example of the possibi- . Hty of improving d.try conditions through the score-card system is , shown in the report of 20 dairies at Riehmond, Va., which made the grcat- ' est percentage of grain from the first serc to tic last during a period o "fgi1 rnqnths. The lowest score. was 20 points on a scale of 100. "This jnec," snuNQic health officer, "was ' indescribably ifeid. Seventeen cows - were huddled into dark foul sheds, . with about 200 cubic feet of air space " to each cow. The -water supply was K grossly contaminated! The milk was ft. j poured from dirty milk pails into cans which stood in manure in a dirty stable yard. Everything was in kecp- ing with this partial picture." This dairyman immediately took steps to meet the requirements of the scoring syitcm in use, and his cows showed steady improvement visit by visit, the &" !l scorc showing 62rS, 'which was ""Ht n')OVC ,c average. The same health 'Wv officer further states: "Common justice demands tlmt full H credit should be given to the milk fL producers and to the -city dairymen I for their share in what has been ac- comp'ished. To anyone who was familiar with the conditions under which milk was produced and sold in this city a year ago, a visit to the ,.. dairy farms supplying us with milk at Ihc present time would prove lit- 4 tic short of astonishing. On every hand new stables have been erected and old ones improved, milk houses 'vhavc gone up, stable yards improved, 7JT'" and most important of all, better mc- , thods of milking, handling, and rlf transporting milk." - Mail' Jargc dealers employ an in-spector in-spector to give dairies supplying them with milk a rating on the basis "of the ( ' score card, requiring them to reach a certain standard or stop shipping milk. To illustrate: One large milk company added the following note to f the list of prices: "These prices apply ap-ply only to those dairymen whose , premises arc scored Co per cent or higher by the department of health. k . Those who scorc loss than this will have a reduced price paid, and milk from dairies scoring less than 50 per cent is not desired and will not be accepted." 'Unless public sentiment demands ft good quality of milk and consumers arc ready to meet the increased cost, improvement must necessarily be sfow. |