Show SHALL THE COW BE GIVEN A REST in all the large well handled dairy herds of america and among the good herdsmen the question of shall the cow be given a rest is never considered other than that she shall the idea that we have had in the western country that when a cow is dry she needs very little to eat is wrong and the sooner we get away from this condition and practice the better off we will get from our dairy cows to produce milk is just as much a tax on the system of the dairy cow as hard work is on the average draft horse and for that reason it requires considerable energy eni I 1 and nutrients to keep up the body it has been proved beyond question that cows when dry for a month to six weeks are much better producers than if milked up to within two weeks pr or a few days of their calving time the only chance the herds man to get ahead of the cow in feed is when she is not producing regularly at this time there is a good opportunity to build up the body of the animal and if she is anything like the right kind she immediately returns the stored up material in her milk as soon as she freshens cows that are milked right up to calving invariably will have a normal calf in every way but the detriment comes to the mother rather than to the calf the cow koiv that is not given a rest before cst Iving bas a milk ik now flow that is at a much lower level than the cow that is given a rest and she never reaches the maximum production throughout that period that she otherwise would she merely dwindles along giving half her usual amount of milk and never reaches the same ame i flow that she did in her other lactation periods |