342 



THE AGRICULTURAL NEWS. 



November 2. 1918. 



THE GO-TA-NI BEAN. 

 The following int'onnaiion concerning a new kind 

 of bean called 'go-ta-ni', is abstracted from the Jour- 

 nal of the Royal Society of Arts, Angiist 23, 1918. 

 This would appear to be a valuable bean, and possibly 

 one which would prove worthy of trial in these West 

 Indian colonies: — 



Attention is drawn by the Vnited States Consul at 

 Mombasa to the production in East Africa of a new kind of 

 bean, called the 'go-ta-ni', which is described as yielding two 

 crops per annum, with high percentage of albuminoids and 

 oil, while the moisture is low. The owner of the estate at 

 Changamwe, where the experiments have been made, calls 

 the product a cross between the ^fadapascar butter bean and 

 the • Cannvalia ciisiformis. It is credited with a yield of 

 22 cwt. of dried marketable beans per acre during the 1916 

 season. The Momhasn Times, in an article on the subject, 

 gives the following details: — 



'The period for maturing is five munth.". The plant is 

 a standard perennial, and attains an average height of 2 feet , 

 6 inches. It is extremely hardy, being both a drought and 

 insect resister. The foliage is dense, and if planted 1 foot 

 apart in drills, the rows being 3 feet apart, it entirely 

 prevents the growth of weeds. At this distance 6.3 lb. of 

 seed will plant an acre. The seed readily germinates. 

 When the plants are 6 inches high, the ground should be 

 hoed, after which they require no attention until the crop 

 comes off. Planted between youcg coco-nut palms, coffee, 

 sisal, etc., they do away with at least two cleanings per year, 

 while their foliage offers excellent shade and protection to the 

 young plants. , . , , 



'The pods attain a length of U to 1(5 inche.s, and yield 

 fourteen to sixteen perfect beans, which are :,'-by 1-to i-by-^ 

 inch in two dimensions, and i-inch thick. They are white 

 externally, the hiium being brown. The interior is a 

 pale ye'low, and they possess an agreeable flavour. tJn a 

 sample sent to England £1 8 per ton was offered. This works 

 oat at £19 16a. per acre every six months. .\s the crop can 

 be picked, thi ashed, and bagged on the land, it should prove 

 one of the most profitable pro<lucts grown in the colony. 



•The advantages of a perennial legun e of this nature 

 are manifold, and cannot be over estimated. For planters it 

 reduces the tremendous cost of cleaning to a minimum, and 

 brings the plantation into an almost immediate paying 

 concern. It gives a good return in tix months with very 

 little outlay. . . 



'There is nothing in the chemical analysis to indicate 

 that the material is unfit for fopd; on the contrary, the 

 beans should provide a nitrogenous food of a ooncentrated 

 kind, the protein content being nearly equal to that of dried 

 beef. No prussic acid has been detected in the macerated 

 product, nevertheless, if Jhe material has not been used before 

 aa fof>d for human beings or animals, it would .be advisable to 

 ascertain by nxperiment that no|_ poisonous sub.stance is 

 present 



THE 



ROLE OF WATER IN A COW'S 

 RATION. 

 It is fairly generally known that some dairymen claim 

 that if the amount of drinking water given to a cow is 

 limited, the body temperature is raised, the composition of 

 the milk mt^ified, and the percentage of fat especially 

 increased. In order to verify this assertion, a series of eiperi- 

 ments was underUken in the I'nited States of America on 



the effect of watering cows at ditterent intervals with varying 

 quantities of water, on the following factors: amount of food 

 consumed, digestibility of food, (piantity and composition of 

 milk, composition and quality of butter fat, body temperature 

 and physical condition of the cow. The experiment was 

 divided into three periods, separated by a period in which the 

 ratif II was normal. In the first period the animals were water- 

 ed every twenty-four hours (an average of 61-65 B). per head), 

 in the second period every sixty hours (an average of .'3r20 B). 

 per head), in the third period with half the normal ration 

 of water (4000 lb. per head). The following were the results 

 obtained, according to the JMoiithly BtiUctm of Agricultural 

 Iittf/iii^eiice and Plant Diseases, June 1918: — 



Fund eo»sumed.^AM\en the cows ate watered once in 

 twenty. four hours instead of two or three limes, there is a 

 slight decrease in the total amount of food taken and in the 

 tjuantity of milk produced, but this second decrease is not 

 proportionate to the first. During the thirty days of the 

 experiment the animals lost an average of 11 B). per head. 

 This los.s w?s much greater during the second test (17 tb.), 

 and the third (9.5 lb.) per head, on an average. 



During the periods in which the cows received a full 

 ration of water at long intervals, the expected decrease in 

 milk production wa'^ not obtained. If the slight decrease in 

 the amount of food consumed and the loss in weight be 

 considered, it must be concluded that cows can utilize the 

 water stored in their systems for milk production and other 

 functions. When thd- cows only received half the normal 

 quantity of water, there was a marked decrease in the amount 

 of hay consumed, milk produced, and in body weight. 



Di,i;estio>i of rations.- ^\\fi coefficient of digestibility 

 was increased in each of the tests in which the intervals 

 between watering were lengthened, and in those in which the 

 cows only received half the normal ration of water. This 

 increase in the coefficient of digestibility is particularly 

 inarkeil in the case of crude hbre. Cows watered once in 

 twenty-four hours digested .5.5 per cent, of crude fibre as com- 

 pared with 54 per cent, digested by the control animals 

 watered three times a day; cows waterfd once in sixty hours 

 digested 7D07 per cent, of fibre as against 5.5-7 per cent, by 

 the control animals, and those receiving half a ration of 

 water digested about 2 per cent, more than the control 

 animals. 



These resulLs show that to obtain the most efficient 

 digestion of food, it is wise not to water the animals too 

 abundantly at feeding time, or immediately before or after 

 a heavy meal 



Effect of the :/iiaiitity of umter in^^estcd, on tin. </inintity 

 and composition of tlu'-viilk —In -ill the tests, the composition 

 of the milk and butter fat remained absolutely unchanged 

 It is for this reason that a cow receiving insufficient water 

 goes dry without thereibeing any modification in the compo- 

 sition,c'f lier milk Frequent watering has little influence 

 on the quantity of milk produced. When the normal water 

 ration was reduced by half, the milk yield was reduced a little 

 at the beginning, this reduction increasing as the experiment 

 continued, till it was about a quarter. There is no doubt 

 that the cowa would have gone dry if this ration had been 

 continued. 



Kffect of water oh the body temperature of the C07V.— 

 When the cows were watered every twenty-four hours the 



body temperature was lowered by the fraction of one degree 

 Fahrenheit fifteen minutes after watering With intervals of 

 sixty hours', the temperature dropped 2"F. The minimum 

 was obtained one to oneandahalf hours after watering 

 (130 ft), of water per head). The temperature of cow.x 

 receiving half the normal ration of water was TF, higher 



