The average dairy cow in the United States produces annually about 4,000 pounds of milk and 160 pounds of butterfat. The world’s record for milk production is 37,381.4 pounds and for butterfat 1,252 pounds. Thus the record cow gave nine times as much milk and about eight times as much butterfat as the average dairy cow. The original wild cow gave only enough milk for one calf, yet it is from this original cow that the modern milk-producing machine descended and will continue to descend and improve for years to come. When we realize the transcendent important of milk in the human diet—and especially for the young; and when we remember that cheap and common feeds supplemented by ration-balancing concentrates are converted into milk and butter by the cow machine, the question comes. “why is there not at least one cow on every farm, and why does the average cow produce so much less milk and butter than a really good cow?” the answer is that the average cotton farmer as a rule does not appreciate or even know what a really good cow is. He thinks milk a luxury rather than a food.
It costs but little more to feed and care for a four-gallon cow than to feed and care for a two-gallon cow. Since the upkeep of an average cow costs about two gallons of milk per day, there may be no profit from a two-gallon cow, but a 100 per cent profit from a four-gallon cow. Another advantage that comes from keeping cows and other animals capable of high production is the fact that high-production animals have high-production offspring. High production is inherited, reproduced, transmitted—so is low production.
“Which do you choose?”
From the editorial page of The Progressive Farmer magazine, published every Saturday, March 25, 1922.
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