MUSIC MEANS MORE MILK

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 55, 20 March 1937, Page 15

MUSIC MEANS MORE MILK

Cows Love Caruso , -2,

' ' Fafmers, instal loudspeaker# iu your cowsheds! Your cowe will give more That is & giogan which seems as i; it ought to be attaehed to & coinic. papar drawing. It is, indeed, not easy to explain that this is a diseovory Which should be takou quite seriously., the praetieal aigaifleance of which cannot yet be foretold. It is a fact tbat udvanced tamera have been eagaged on experiments of this kind for a considerable time. More than ten years ago a German thesis was written on tbe infiuenee of music on milk yield, and was sponsored by the milk economy scetiou pf the Univereity of Halle. Then caxne reports of American experiments which sounde.d so etartling— increase of -milk and fat yield by.nearly a third without ohanga of feed xnerely by playing gramophone records duiing ndlking — that they gave rise to much shaking of heads. Now, however, there is a new foundation for experiments in this field, A diplomaed faxmer and inspoctor of stud livestock, Georg Tartler, who has already produced a nuaber of responsible works, has now published a book in. which he gives the results of experiments with milking and mnsic car* xied out over a period of yeafs in various German model farms. Lengthy records compiled in accordance with all the principles of scientific accuracy fhow in actual fact an astonishing increase in milk yield merely through

playing gramophone records while milking, In q^dition to drily presented statistics, however, we learn many other intriguing things. It has been shown, for instance, that the cows which are most sensitive to music are those which have the best characteristics in other ways. The kind of music which affects them most is easy to ascertainj they prefer heavy, slow melodies, and have their favourite piecesj one loved a Caruso record beyond everything, and another: "To-night or Never." While one piece reduced one cow to a state of melting acquiesceace and boundless milk yield, the same piece had no effect at all on another, and too frequent repetition produced dulled indifference in all cases. The author is seeking to ascertain the psychological eauses of theae phenomena, which lead to interesting comparisons with the effect of mnsic onhnman beings.