HOME SEPARATION.

Ohinemuri Gazette, Volume XXII, Issue 2787, 8 May 1911, Page 2

HOME SEPARATION.

A INTERESTING ADDRESS.

In view ot the discussion in various

parts ol the dominion as to the merits of home and creamery separation of milk, the following address by Mr Dempster, of the Government dairying staff, delivered at a meeting of the Waikato Farmers' Club, at Cambridge, should prove of interest. Mr Dempster said home separation had been a great advantage to the settler in the backblocks in enabling him to take his cream to a factory which he would otherwise, owing to bad road* and the distance to be travelled, be debarred from supplying. He was. thus supposed to save considerably in the matter of haulage, but this was not so, for owing to the cleaner skimming at the factory the man , who supplied milk received a better return than the one who did his own separating; A factory working under the home,. separation system did not produce as much butter from the same number of cows as did a factory running on the creamery system, for at the latter the, • separator was run by trained men and the loss in skimming was reduced to a minimum. According to a return from the dairy schools of the United States the average loss on the farm by home separation was '25, as against '097 by the creamery. The latter system therefore would bring more money into the dominion as it would produce more butter for export. Of course the home separated milk was better for the calves for it lessened the risk of disease, the calves getting the milk sweet and warm, whilst there was. more fat in it.

There was considerable danger, however, in feeding milk straight from the separator to pigs and calves, for being so full oi air it had a tendency to blow them. Pasteurised milk was the remedy for checking tuberculosis, and it had been proved by experiments at Glen Oroua, in the Manawatu, that pasteurisation was an effective means of combating the disease. With regard to the quality of the butter made from homeseparated cream he considered that it was not equal to butter made under the creamery system, for it was impossible to expect the same cleanliness on the premises of a farmer as was to be found in the creameries. The latter were

managed by men whose duty it was to see that their premises were spotless, whilst the farmer had a hundred and one things to attend to. Neither had the farmer the facilities for keeping everything in a thoroughly sanitary con-

dition. Cream also developed a taint quicker than milk, and it was not possible therefore for the creamery manager to produce such a good article from cream separated by various persons as from that separated under his own supervision. It would not be so bad if the cream was delivered daily, but in many instances it was only, received at the factory two or three times a week. Denmark had no home separation, and topped the market as regards prices, whilst New Zealand, where hitherto the system had only a slight hold, came, second. As a practical man he was emphatically of opinion that the system of home separation would lower the quality ot the country's output, and would be detrimental to the export trade. After considerable discussion, in which most of those present look part, a hearty vote of thanks to Mr Dempster tor his address concluded the meet-