MILKING COWS.

Patea Mail, 17 January 1882, Page 4

MILKING COWS.

The period of milking may be classed iu three parts. For the first, six or seven weeks after calving the largest quantity of milk is produced. After this the yield falls off pretty considerably, but then remains at about the same figure for two or three months, when a steady decline sets in until the cow is perfectly dry. By carelul feeding the best parts of the milking periods may be prolonged, and this ought to be the aim of all milk producers. If green fodder and other food which stimulates milk secretions can be used at the right time, a considerable extra quantity of milk may be produced. "During the milking periods the proportion of the caseine increases and that of butter decreases. Milk produced by cows soon after calving contains, therefore, more butter and less caseine than later, and the difference is great enough to make itself felt in the larger dairies, if the cows calve about the same part of the year.

The s.s. Westport with 2,048 casks of cement for the New Plymouth harbor works brought up within 1,000 feet of the end of the breakwater, and it is reported quite possible for her to go alongside the breakwater at full tide. The Public Works Department has received tenders for the supply and delivery of 2000 tons of stone for the further extension of harbor works at Westport, improvements there being necessary to meet the growing coal trade. The New South Wales Parliament has agreed to the plana and books of reference for the railway extensions from Cootamundra to Gundagai, Narrandera to Jerilderie, Goulburn to Cooma, Murrainhurrah to Young (to be finally extended to Blayney), and Orange to near Forbes. The line from the Clarence river to the table lands of New England is still left off the Estimates. The Tiraaru Herald reports that'some of the best crops this year will he found on the Levels Downs. Two of the finest are adjoining ones comprising some 360 acres. Judging by present appearances, they should average fully 40 bushels to the acre. The heads are exceptionally well developed, the straw being some 4ft 65n in length. One of the finest lights on the Atlantic sea-board of the United States is that at Absecom, near Atlantic City, which has a Fresnel lens of the first order, giving a mass of light six feet wide and ten feet high, visible at sea to distances of twenty miles.