Measuring Milk.

Te Aroha News, Volume IV, Issue 196, 26 March 1887, Page 2 (Supplement)

Measuring Milk.

An agricultural writer says that if the testa of noted cowg were made known in quarts, instead of pounds, the experiments would be more easily understood. It may be supposed that every farmer knows how many pounds of milk are contained in a gallon, but the common custom of measuring with the liquid system is not easily usurped, and we may safely assert that there are hundreds of farmers who read of the yield of cows, given as so many pounds of milk, and yet did not feel competent to state what that quantity should do in liquid measure. The method of weighing by the scales also misleads, as the quantity is usually seemingly larger than that from good dairy cows ; but give the record in quarts and every farmer understands the quantity at once. Milk does not weigh the same under all conditions. A gallon of now milk should weigh eight pounds and eight ounces, or two pounds and two ounces per quart. It re quires a pencil and paper for the farmer to reduce a certain number of pounds to the more familiar quarts, owing to the weight of q, quarb exceeding two pounds, and with a fraction to contend against. Again, skimmed milk weighs an ounce more to the gallon, or eight pounds and nine ounces, while cream weighs only eight pounds and four ounces. Buttermilk, however, weighs eight pounds, eight and a half ounces, and

the fraction in that case is a bother. Few farmers read milk records closely when pounds are given, for they do not wish too much arithmetic in simple statements, although the weight system may be preferable at times ; but give the production in quarts, and greater interest will be created in the tests, for the easier and more thoroughly understood the experiments, the better for those who make them and for those who are indirectly interested.