be grown to greater advantage than in Missouri and Kansas. In no other region can there be grown a greater variety of supplemental crops-red clover, cowpeas, sorghum, millet, and others-and these constitute the basis of excellent and cheap rations for dairy cows. Within these and adjacent States are grown flax and cotton, the seed of which is worked up in the extensive mills of St. Louis and Kansas City, thus giving the farmers the advantage of the oil meals for stock food at the lowest possible prices.

Another advantage given by the geographical position of Missouri and Kansas is that markets for dairy goods are to be found in almost all directions, with large distributing and consuming centers within their borders. As a matter of fact, the home market has never yet been fully supplied with butter and cheese of local production. The city of St. Louis alone consumes annually hundreds of tons of butter and cheese shipped in from other States.

TOPOGRAPHY.

The topography of this region may be briefly described.

MISSOURI.

If a line be drawn from the northeast corner of the State to the southwest corner, nearly all of the prairie country will be found north and west of this line. This section is divided into several drainage areas served by numerous streams and their branches, all making their way to the Missouri River, which flows through the center of the State. On the lowlands along these streams the early settlers found abundant timber, and a dense growth of prairie grasses upon the uplands. The general surface is rolling, with an exceedingly small proportion of waste land. This is a region of unsurpassed agricultural resources, having an easily worked, fertile soil, with timber enough for home use, and being well watered and well supplied with railroads. Southeast of the line before mentioned, particularly south of the Missouri River, is the Ozark Mountain region. This is an extensive plateau, traversed by the St. Louis and San Francisco Railroad along its highest elevation from St. Louis to the southwest corner of the State. There is a much larger proportion of waste land in this part of the State, but much of that which is regarded as of little value for cropping affords good pasturage and will in time be the home of vast numbers of cows. Land is cheap, and with the mild climate this should be an ideal place in which to raise calves for dairy cows, a business which can be made very profitable.

KANSAS.

Kansas is much less diversified. The extreme eastern part of the State is generally rolling prairie, like western Missouri, with some timber along the streams. To the westward the timber decreases and disappears, and the grasses change to the varieties adapted to the

arid and semi-arid plains. The map at page 14 shows the creameries of Kansas to be mainly found at present in the eastern and easterncentral parts of the State, but they are being rapidly established farther westward. A few years ago the thought that dairying could be made profitable in this region would have been generally regarded as absurd. At the present rate of development it will not be many years before Kansas will appear almost as thickly dotted with creameries as Iowa is to-day.

METHODS OF FEEDING.

The general practice of dairy farmers in both Missouri and Kansas is to pasture their cows during the summer. The soiling system is practiced to a very limited extent, although there is a growing tendency in that direction. At present the practice is to grow a field of fodder corn or sorghum to be cut green and fed to the cows when pastures begin to get short from drought. The feeding of grain to the cows while on pasture, though as yet but little practiced, is growing in favor. Wheat bran can usually be bought for $10 and ship stuff (middlings) at about $12 a ton. Oil-cake (linseed) meal costs from $20 to $25 a ton. The use of a little of these foods at night and morning is found by the dairymen to help out the pastures, keep up the milk flow, and maintain the cows in good condition. With many it takes about four acres of land to winter and summer each cow. Others are feeding so that they can make one-half that area of land do the work, while a few have learned that by means of the soiling system for summer and the silo for winter feeding, properly supplemented with grain, they can make one acre furnish as much cow food as was formerly done by four.

PASTURE.

Blue grass (Poa pratensis) is the favorite pasture grass, its chief merit being in its characteristic early and late growth, thus prolonging the pasture season. In fact, with sufficient land in blue grass, one can have pasturage the greater part of the year. In this climate, after the seed stalk is thrown up, which is early in the spring, there follows a dense growth of long, flexible blades, which on the approach of winter lie recumbent and continue green underneath, so that stock graze upon it whenever it is not covered too deep with ice and snow. In midsummer, when rains are infrequent, blue grass does but little good, particularly if it has been grazed closely in the spring. To the man who became possessed of large tracts of land when values were low, or who inherited an estate of broad acres, blue grass is the acme as a pasture grass. It enables such a person to keep a large amount of stock with small expenditure of labor. It is an unsurpassed stock food, rapidly producing flesh of excellent quality. As a dairy pasture nothing is better, giving to butter at all times of the year the rich June color which is so highly prized. But in these later days, when dairying

as well as all other lines of farming must be placed on a business basis, and interest on one's investment, which in most cases includes land ranging in value from $50 to $100 an acre, must be included in the expense account, the matter of two or three extra acres to a cow is important. It is found that to conform to the present low prices and small margins, blue grass comes far from meeting the requirements. If it would grow as one of a mixture of grasses it would be valuable in permanent pastures, utilizing land that can not well be cultivated; but it will submit to no joint occupancy of the land with other grasses. It will not stand close grazing, and, as before remarked, it makes little or no growth during midsummer, hence the dairy farmers of Missouri are depending less and less on blue grass for pasture. At present fully half of the pasturage is blue grass, but this is being fast replaced with timothy, orchard, and other grasses and clovers.

PASTURING HARVESTED CORNFIELDS.

The pasture season usually covers about seven months, extending from the middle of April to the middle of November. During the early part of winter a common practice is to turn the cows and other stock into the cornfields from which the grain has been gathered, the stalks having been left standing. Much of the fodder is eaten, together with such weeds and grass as may have been allowed to grow, and corn ears overlooked in the harvesting. If these stalk fields are thus utilized before there have been severe frosts and continued rains, the stock will gain something from them; otherwise, about all they get of value is the grain. More trouble and loss of neat stock is suffered from this practice than from almost all other causes. It is a practice of the general farmers rather than of the dairymen, for the latter have found that while stalk fields can be bought for 25 to 50 cents an acre, they do not supply profitable food when treated in this way.

FEEDING CORN FODDER.

If they raise corn themselves, it pays to cut the stalks before they are weather beaten, and put them into shocks 12 by 12 or 16 by 16 hills square. The general practice according to this plan is to husk out the corn and shock or haul to the barn and stack the fodder, feeding it uncut in the yard. Yet this affords very little gain over field feeding. Many are, however, buying fodder cutters or shredders, with which to cut or crush the fodder, and this is a most economical and commendable advance. Others do not husk the corn, but cut up stalks and ears together, thus feeding the grain with the fodder. If the earless stalks are cut, the short fodder is usually moistened and mixed with ground grain, bran, ship stuff, and a little oil meal, making a mixture that is readily eaten by cows, with very little waste. By these methods of utilizing the corn fodder, many dairy farmers are proving the correctness of experimental results published by the agricultural

stations in several States, which show that the stalks or fodder of an acre of corn contain as much nutrition as the grain from the same land. The only work necessary to make this food material available and prof itable is to put it into such mechanical condition that cattle will consume it without waste. With modern methods and appliances this can be easily done. Uncut corn fodder is troublesome to handle in the barn, and if fed loosely in the yard most of it is wasted. The writer has fed corn to cows during the past winter in a way that is quite satisfactory. Stalls were made, each for two cows, but with a simple, long manger, so wide and deep that an armful of uncut corn could be laid in at full length. Ears were not removed from the stalks, thus feeding to the cows the entire corn plant (minus the root), with no labor or preparation, and saving the cost of husking, shelling, and grinding the grain and cutting the fodder. The stalks are not eaten as closely as when run through a fodder cutter or shredder, yet when a comparatively small stalked variety is grown, and the corn cut at the proper age, the amount of refuse is surprisingly small. Considerable unmasticated and undigested corn passes through the cows, but with pigs to clean up after them this need cause no waste. After having fed corn in the different ways recommended, this method generally suits so well that the fodder cutter often stands idle in the winter. Other grain has been fed separately to balance the too carbonaceous corn, with occasional feeds of sorghum fodder, millet, and clover hay. The results have been very satisfactory as to the condition of the cows, their milk flow, and the cost of keeping and labor.

If properly managed, the corn fodder, which heretofore in the corngrowing States of the West has been largely wasted, can be converted into cow food of almost incredible value. There are grown yearly in Missouri over 6,000,000 acres of corn. Of this less than half is cut up for fodder, so that at least 3,000,000 acres of corn fodder are practically allowed to go to waste. This is enough to winter, on a liberal allowance and with other feed in proper proportion, 1,000,000 cows, which, if fresh in the autumn, could be made to yield a profit of $10 a head from this winter's feeding, making a total return of $10,000,000.

FEEDING WHEAT STRAW.

Another article of cow food produced largely in Missouri and Kan. sas is wheat straw; but this is wasted for the most part and in many cases burned. When fed, the usual custom is to let stock run to the stack of straw in winter, eating what they want, but wasting more. Probably a million tons of wheat straw are thus wasted annually in Missouri. Although this material is far from being as nutritious as cornstalks, it furnishes bulk and has some food value; if properly balanced with bran, oil meal, and clover hay, this straw would keep through the winter at least 500,000 head of cows.

What is true in these respects of Missouri is correspondingly

applicable to Kansas, both being corn-growing States and having also a large acreage of wheat.

In no other way can this enormous quantity of stock food, corn fodder, and wheat straw, now wasted, be utilized to so good advantage as by feeding to cows. No other class of stock will eat it so readily or make so good returns for it, if given proper shelter, daily care, and the supplemental grain food necessary to fully utilize these coarse materials.

WATER SUPPLY.

An adequate supply of good water is a requisite for success in dairying, but all of our Western dairymen have not fully recognized this important matter. It is true that there are natural obstacles to providing such a supply. Excepting the Ozark region of south Missouri, flowing springs are not found as commonly as in the hill countries of the Northeastern States, yet the farmers of Missouri and Kansas have it within their power to secure an adequate supply of pure water.

Wells are easily dug or bored, and at depths varying from 30 to 75 feet-usually at less than 50 feet-an abundance of pure water is found. This can be raised to the surface by windmills or hand pumps, thus furnishing water for the stock and for use in the dairy. Many dairymen have arrangements by which a windmill raises the water, and it flows through a pipe into the dairy house, filling a tank in which the milk is set. The water is kept fresh and the overflow runs to troughs in the stock yards and barns for the use of the animals. A much larger number of farmers, however, depend on surface ponds for stock water supply. As usually made and cared for, these are quite objec tionable. It should be explained that underlying the soil of most of this Western prairie country there is a clay or hardpan which is quite impervious to water. By choosing a place on a hillside, removing the surface soil and clay and making a dam on the lower side, a basin is formed which catches water from the shed above. Properly located so as to get the water from grass land, and fenced to prevent stock from getting into it, this water is pure and good, although not as clean as well water. In winter it is too cold for cows, and in summer too warm to be palatable. These two objections can be overcome by providing a cistern into which the water from the pond is conducted, passing it through a filter of sand and charcoal. From this cistern the water can be pumped to supply the stock. In too many cases, however, the shal low pond, filled with surface water drawn frequently from sources which contaminate the supply, and in which the stock is allowed to stand, is the only provision made for drinking water for the cows; hogs often have access to the same pool. This gets very warm and foul in summer, and in winter the cows are allowed to drink once a day or possibly only once in two days from holes cut through the ice. It is needless to say that men who attempt to keep dairy cows under such conditions are not advancing their own interests or those of the State.