PAGES FROM DAIRYING HISTORY.

Shannon News, 10 August 1926, Page 3

PAGES FROM DAIRYING HISTORY.

■ —♦ EXIT WHOLE' MILK—ENTER HOME SEPARATION. CREAMERIES’ DAY PASSES. The year 1926 will mark the commencement of a new era in the history of dairying' in New Zealand. First and foremost there is the passage of the measure endorsing Dairy Produce Control through the Lower House, and the revelation that, for ail the noisy propaganda canned on inopponents of Control, ibe real opposition to it is very weak and futile. Another great step towards the betterment of the whole industry is the introduction of ihc Bill providing for' the grading ,of cream and the payment by factories to suppliers according to quality. A few years ago both' control and cream grading were regarded as beyqpd The most sanguine dreams of the most progressiye section of the industry. Their adoption in daily practice, however, is not more surprising than the change of. attitude that has taken place in regard to home separation. Most dairymen can remember the time when teome separation was condemned gen orally by the State experts from the Commissioner (as the head of the Department ,was then designated) downwards, and was regarded by factory managers with anything but favour, ideas "change however, and now that it has been demonstrated that home separation, propertly carried out, is as efficient as the creamery system, it is being adopted in all directions, in the Levin district ihc coming _ or electric power and as the perfection of motor’ transit bas given tbo development a great impetus, end what was even last year-looked upon as an impossibility lias quietly come to pass. The new season .will commence with home separatioii in lull operation hi. the Levin Dairy Company s district. A Chronicle representative recently had an opportunity of Reviewing the years between 1899 —when the Levin Dairy Company was “born”—and |i)2C--wiien the creamery wheels ceased to turn, and the fanner had capitalised his hard-gotten experience ot the past. Starting with 17 suppliers in the year 1899, the. Levin. Dairy Company ■ increased tins number to 30 by the close of the* year, despite the opposition of a- Dairy Union creamery in Levin. Air E. S. Lancaster was then chairman of directors,- Mr 3. Aim (now of Shannon) being manager of the factory which, in its initial year, had an output ol approximately, 50 tons of huttci. IMAKAUA.

It was during Mr Aim’s term ui' management, and about the year. 1902, that the Ihakara creamery was built. Prior to 'the establishment of a creamery at Ihakara, the settlors there had carted the milk to Levin, and among the list of suppliers one finds several well-known, names, ind iding Mosers J. I). Brown, 3. Saxon, F. E. .uurneJl, 3. P*erry, W. Laing, senr., P. E, Palmes, 3. Horne, R. Horae, S. Birch, A. C. McDonald, S. A. Broadbelt, and others, lhakara’s Reserve Road, Potts’ Road, Wallace Road and, K-o----putaroa Road, were, then, unmetalled, the strength of horse and vehiclebeing severely taxed in the conveyance of ° milk to* the creamery. At the 'start about 1000 gallons of milk per day was the quantity received, this being gradually increased until, as season replaced season, three times that quantity of milk was being delivered during.ilie “flush” of 1917? With the effluxion of time, and new settlers arriving in the Heaiher]ca and Koputaroa districts, it became evident that Ihakara was both inadequate and ‘inconvenient, so -a creaiuefv was -established at Heatlierlea, whence drifted a number of Ihakara suppliers. This hew arrival functioned very satisfactorily, and attained a supply equal to 1800-2090 gallons per day at the “peak.” LINTON. ■ in the -early years of tiny Levin Dairy ; Company’s history, dairymen in tire Linton district were suppliers of home-separated cream, but, although the cream business increased in volume, neither director’s nor manager looked with favour upon this section .of the company’s operations. New suppliers added their weight of opinion to the belief of older suppliers that Linton -should have-its own kflepot, and eventually—in 1905 to be bexact—a* creamery was erected, at Linton, to which 25 big producers directed their supplies for a matter of six years. The' suppliers then asked for the installation of a cheese factory, their request was granted, but the ’venture was not a success, and suppliers becoming dissatisfied with tiie results obtained, unlil at the end of two- years the cheese factory closed down. 'Since that time the supply has gradually diminished, until tire creamery was closed at the end of last season in favour of home separation. OHAU. Ohau creamery was built in 1904, by the Dairy Union, and worked as ■such for one year. The Levin Dairy Company was being supplied with cream from the herds ol Messis L. Davies (father of 'Mr 3. Davies,, > • Welsh and H. Richard, while the land now owned by -Mrs Kirkcaklie, was then cut up into small farms, and tho Ohau creamery prospered for many years Milk came from even as far as Kuk-u but, with the advent of a cheese factory at the latter place, this avenue of supply was practically removed The supply fo Ohau was Mill • further depleted by the installation of a factory at Kimberley Road, built, in 1910, With a promise of' 295 cows in the district, This number rapidly crew encouraged somewhat by the Sub-division of the Government block

of bush land, resulting -in the creamery serving a very useful purpose for many years. THE NEW ORDER. The Levin Dairy Company first carted cream from the Oturoai-Foxton Road sector, instead of building a creamery, and the foresight of the directors has been fully justified by the extent to which home-separation has developed. Home-separated cream now represents 76 per cent, of tile total supply, but, now that the'creameries are. closed, the Levin factory, in the corning season, will be entirely a home-cream one with an output of approximately 1009 tons of butter. This -departure of the Levin factory is, by no means, novel or isolated, as a large number of districts throughout the Dominion have been operating on a home-separation basis for some time, and making a first-class product where cream is collected daily. In some of the North Auckland regions where the cream is collected on every other day, very good results are being secured, governed to a large extent by the care which the supplier exercises in the treatment of his cows, method of separation, cleanliness in the dairy. Following on the heels* of dairy farm instruction is the discarding of unsanitary, haphazard methods for a happier, more logical system of cream separation and dispatch, and the substitution of farm efficiency for the slip-shod methods which obtained in many farms of the last decades Home cream factories are the new order, and the farmer of to-morrow will look back upon the year 1926 as the first leaf in the book which tells of ! the farmer’s emancipation from one of the drudgeries of dairy farming.