THE FARM.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 4, Issue 83, 15 September 1915, Page 4

THE FARM.

Chemical tests show tfcat the yellow colour in milk consists of several well-known pigments found in green plants. Of these the principal one is carotin, bo called because it constitutes a large part of the colouring matter of canots. The other yellow pigments in the milk are found in a number of plants, including grass, but are specially abundant in yellow autumn leaves. These pigments pass directly from the feed into the milk. Ibis explains the tact that fresh, green grass and carrots increase the yellowness of butter, the only standard by which the average person judges its richness. On the other hand, a large proportion of these pigments is deposited in the body fat and elsewhere in the ccw. When the ration is changed to one containnig few a carotin cmstitutents, this hoardtd store is gradually drawn up, and in consequence the yellowness of the milk does cot diminish so rapidly ts it otherwise would. This yellowness increases, however, the instant the necessary plant pigments are restored to the ration. Green grass ii probably richer in carotin than any other dairy feed. Cows fed on it will therefore produce the highest coloured butter. Green maize, in which carotids constitute the chief pigments, will also produce a highly coloured product. On the other a ration of bleached clover hay and yellow maize is practically devoid of yellow pigments, and the milk from cows fed upon it will gradually lose i'.s colour. It is, of course, indisputably true that the breed does influence the colour of the milk fat; but vary the ration, and there will be corresponding variation in the colour of the miik fat in each breed. In cows of the Jersey and Guernsey breeds thy body fat is frequently of such a deep yellow colour that some butchers and consumers look with disfavour upon the beef from these breeds. For this prejudice there is absolutely no justification. The yellowness of the tat springs from the same causes as tha yellowness of the milk fat, and there is no reason for objecting in one case to the very thing that is prized in the other. People are realising more and more each year that farming is a business; that it ia the greatest business in the world. Realising that fact they are coming to treat it as a business, instead of a tark or an occupation, and nothing more, writes an American exchange. This means doing the business in a businesslike manner. The business man pays special attention to certain fundamental problems. These are:—To reduce the cost of producing. To increase the net selling price of the things which is produced. Community breeding is one of the greatest possible factors in solving all three of these major problems. It enables tha individual farmer to have tbe use of highgrade, expensive breeding animals at a less cost than he could it he were operating independently of bis fellow-farmers—thus reducing his cost of operations or production;. These higher quality breeding animals increase both the quality and the quantity of his product without increasing the cost of that production, when measured on a unit basis. This higher quality of producr, combined with tbe cooperative methods of marketing the animals and their products which are used amorg community breeders, increases the net price which the farmer gets for his product. Thus community breeding is seen to be a big step in the right direction in the great business of farming.