BACTERIA AND MILK

Shannon News, 1 March 1927, Page 2

BACTERIA AND MILK

I POWERS OF REPRODUCTION. Basteria are the lowest form of plant life, if they can really be classied as plants; and they are so small that few people, unless they have studied the subject of bacteriology and examined them under the microscope, have ever seen them. From the standpoint of the diaryman, bacteria aro of the utmost importance, owing to. the fact that milk is such a perishable product and that bacter,ia are everywhere, in the air, on the hands of most persons, in water, and on everything that is in the least bit unclean. * Different forms of bacteria are capable of affecting milk in different ways, some causing it to scour, others to make it ropy, ox bitter, or to coagulate, or to change its colour.

Bacteria arc so small that it is difficult to form a conception of their dimensions. But what they lack in size is made up in their great numbers and powers of reproduction. A cubic centimeter of milk, which contains about 16 drops, frequently contains thousands, sometimes millions, even hundreds of millions, of bacteria. ' A simple drop of sour milk may contain 40,000,000 bacteria. Bacteria reproduce themselves by a very simple process known, as fission. The cell becomes elongated and a partition wall is formed across the middle. The two cells thus formed separate and form two bacteria. Higher plants may take weeks, and months, or even years, to grow to maturity. These simple plants, however under favourable conditions may complete their growth and reproduce themselves in less than an hour.