TURNIPS AND MILK.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXVI, Issue 4863, 10 August 1925, Page 2

TURNIPS AND MILK.

PASTEURISATION AND TAINT. ROOT RATION INDISPENSABLE. A writer in 4he British Journal of Agriculture says :In - three experiments with cows at Bangour, Edinburgh, Lauder and Fagan compared the effect on the yield and composition of milk caused by substituting 721 b of turnips for 61b of protein-rich meals, in a normal ration of 401 b of turnips, 151 b. hay, and 101 b. of concentrates. As might have been expected, the turnip ration produced rather lesis milk, but, contrary to the common expectation, the more watery turnip ration in each experiment produced the milk with the higher fat content. The experimenters suggest that “the easily-digestible carbohydrates contained in the turnips are especially suitable for fat formation.”

One of the objections often urged against the feeding of turnips tb dairy cows is that they taint the' milk. Mr Dunne, writing of the Danish practice, remarks that “the risk of imparting a bad flavour to the butter, popularly called ‘turnip flavour,’ disappeared as soon as the pasteurisation of milk became general. Since the advent of pasteurisation the use of sWede. turnips as a food for dairy cows has been steadily extended in Denmark. Every Danish dairyman is convinced that roost are an indispensable constituent of an economic ration for cows. When roots can be added to the ration in liberal quantities the cost of the ration is reduced to the minimum, and a maximum profit is obtained. It is significant that in recent years little has been heard bf ‘turnip flavour.’ This may be due to the wide extension of the pasteurisation process in the British wnole-milk trade. Replies contain the opinion that pasteurisation from some of the largest firms engaged in the milk trade, however, does not completely eliminate the said flavour. The dairy manager of the Derby Co-operative Society, which retails about 4000 gallons of milk a day, is of the opinion that the aeration of the milk during its proper passage over the cooler is a means of eliminating turnip flavour.” In some districts there is a tendency to rely too much on hay. as the basis of the winter rations of, dairycows. A critical study of such ratiofis and their results in comparison with those which include a good allowance of roots shows that there are limits to the usefulness of hay in milk production. The feeding of large quantities of fibrous fodder taxes the digestive capacity and energy of the cow and reduces her yield. On fair pasture the cow can extract the 151 b of starch equivalent required in the production of three gallons of milk by the consumption of 271 b of dry matter in pasture grass. But to extract the same quantity of nutriment from hay she would have to consume 421 b of dry matter, the digestion and utilisation, of which would obviously divert the energy of the beast from her main function of milk production. In a good dairy ration the starch equivalent per 1001 b of dry matter is about the same as that in pasture grass, to obtain which proportions it is necessary to limit the allowance of dry fibrous fodder to 151 b or 171 b and isupply the rest of the nutriment in the form of concentrates or roots..