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Story: Dairying and dairy products

From grass to milk

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From grass to milk

An average cow in the early 2000s produced about 17 litres of milk each day (17 one-litre milk bottles). This contained about 1.47 kilograms of milk solids. To produce this, the cow had to drink five buckets of water (about 50 litres) and eat about 17 kilograms of pasture dry matter. A kilogram of pasture dry matter is equal to about 5 kilograms of green grass, so 17 kilograms of pasture dry matter equals about 85 kilograms of green grass – the amount of unmown grass shown here.

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Te Ara – The Encyclopedia of New Zealand

by Allan Gillingham

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How to cite this page

Hugh Stringleman and Frank Scrimgeour, Dairying and dairy products – On the farm, Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, https://teara.govt.nz/en/photograph/15715/from-grass-to-milk (accessed 4 June 2026).

Story by Hugh Stringleman and Frank Scrimgeour, published 1 March 2009.

Comments

Macy
21 November 2011
tell the process of how the grass turns into milk