Transactions of RHASS Volume 1940 - Page 082
Image details
| Year | 1940 |
|---|---|
| Transcription |
|
| OCR Text |
152 MILK RECORDS. and checking of results must necessarily be correspondingly relaxed ; which raises misgivings in the minds of many thoughtful persons having the true interests of authenticated milk recording at heart. This, however, represented a serious efiort on the part of the Committee to continue with a useful scheme of milk recording at the lowest possible cost to members during the difficult times ahead. The Association have been fortunate in obtaining a grant at the rate of £500 per year from the Ayrshire Cattle Herd Book Society, and a grant of £100 for 1940 from the British Friesian Cattle Society. The balance of the total cost to the Association of operating the scheme will require to be met by an additional levy on members of milk recording societies. Efforts similar to those of previous years were made to obtain new members for local societies in 1940. The Attested Herds Scheme is undoubtedly proving a great aid in this connection. The number of new members for official records for season 1940 obtained to date is 49, as compared with 90 at the same date for the previous year. All the local societies of 1939 have continued, but the number of recorders’ circuits has been reduced by six. The Rhins of Galloway Society reduced their circuits from five to three, the Dumfriesshire Society from four to three, the Central and South Ayrshire Society from eight to siX, and the Central Scotland Society from six to five. In most of these instances, however, the reason was not so much reduction in members as the desire for economy in working. The number of recorders’ circuits in 1940 is 41, as compared with 47 in the previous year. The total number of herds being officially recorded at the end of March is 850, as compared with 903 for 1939; but the total number of cows tested may show more than a corresponding reduction. This result for the first year of war may be considered satisfactory under the conditions existing. Owing to war conditions, an unusually large number of changes in recorders was only to be expected. The younger men have been, and are being, called up for military service according to age groups. But suitable women recorders had already been trained to take their places. All vacancies to date have been filled, and there remain a sufficient number of approved recorders on the waiting list. So long as women recorders of a suitable type continue to be available no great difficulty in recorder staffing need be anticipated ; when the latter is fully established on a war footing, largely with women recorders, few more than the normal replacements should be required. The Committee have also been able to arrange for the necessary supplies for local societies of sulphuric acid, amylic alcohol, and milk-testing apparatus for 1940, though for all these items somewhat increased prices will require to be paid. MILK RECORDS. _ 153 With regard to unofficial milk records, in order to effect the severe reduction in cost of administrative services that was deemed necessary, it was decided to discontinue this scheme for the duration of the war. It is gratifying, however, to find that the greater proportion of the members have purchased the milk-weighing apparatus previously loaned .to them by the Association, with a view to carrying on mllk recording privately in their own herds, and that a number of the other members have joined local milk recording societies and commenced official recording. Systematic milk recording, or herd-testing as it is termed in some countries, has undoubtedly proved of great value to the dairy farmers in Scotland and elsewhere who have regularly practised it. There is no need to elaborate this point at the present day. Effective as it is in peace-time, there is even more need to maintain and extend the practice in time of war, to ensure, as far as possible, that the dairy cows kept produce milk in sufficient quantity and in the most economical manner. Milk recording enables a dairy farmer to progress by the three main avenues: (1) thorough weeding; (2) economic feeding and more efficient management generally ; (3) skilful breeding. The first two of these are of particular importance at all times, but even more so in time of war. Special diffi- culties to be surmounted will be shortage and high cost of suitable cattle feeding-stuffs and of efficient dairy farm labour. Under these conditions the dairy farmer will still consider he is better off with empty stalls than with cows producing for him a loss. Thus, he will wish, more than ever, to eliminate unprofitable cows from his herd. But skilful breeding for milk production, in the light of the milk records obtained, is no less important, as a well directed effort to increase the proportion of good-milking cows in the cows that are kept. A reduction in the total number of dairy cows in the country is, for various reasons, almost inevitable in years of war, and such reduction will fall to be made good by worth-while cows when peace returns. VOL. Ln. . L |
| Title | Transactions of RHASS Volume 1940 - Page 082 |
