60 REPORTS OX DIFFERENT DESCRIPTIONS OF FOOD FOR STOCK. 



the swedes had always a fair yellow colour, which gave it a much 

 richer appearance. This richer look, however, was uo guarantee 

 of quality when smelt or tasted ; for the mangold butter was 

 usually the sweeter of the two, and would, we believe, have 

 brought a higher price in the market than the Swede butter had 

 it been artificially coloured. Samples of the butter were regu- 

 larly judged by a gentleman whose services as a butter judge 

 are in frequent requisition at the dairy produce competitions in 

 this county, the result of whose judgment we give in a tabulated 

 form in Table III., where will also be found the weights of the 

 milk, the percentages of cream, and the quantities of butter from 

 10 lbs. of whole milk. 



II. Some Experiments on the Comparative Feeding Values of 

 Swedes and Mangolds, 1865. 



The experiments on the comparative feeding values of swedes 

 and mangolds, which we made in the spring of 1864, resulted, con- 

 trary to our expectation, somewhat in favour of swedes ; we 

 therefore resolved to repeat them at the first opportunity. Now, 

 the only season of the year in which experiments on the com- 

 parative feeding values of swedes and mangolds can be made is 

 from January to March inclusive ; for before January mangolds 

 are not ripe, and cause animals fed on them to scour, and after 

 March swedes deteriorate very rapidly. It may be said, indeed, 

 that even in these very months swedes are gradually losing in 

 quality, while mangolds are gradually improving. Our next ex- 

 periment was made in 1865, beginning on January 4th, and end- 

 ing on March 29th. Several important differences were made in 

 the plan of carrying out this experiment from the former one, 

 which it may be well to mention before proceeding to give the 

 results. We thought proper to confine the 1865 experiment 

 entirely to milch cows, not only because such an experiment is 

 more interesting, but also because it is more important. The 

 often-referred-to statistics, collected by the Highland Society ten 

 years ago, show that the cultivation of the mangold in Scotland 

 is chiefly confined to the dairy districts ; and in these districts 

 it will be found that the mangold crop is generally almost ex- 

 clusively reserved for the milch stock. A duplicate experiment 

 was made by taking eight cows, and dividing them into lots of 

 two each as before. As considerable difference of opinion exists 

 regarding the time in which a change of food affects the animal, 

 we lengthened the periods from 14 to 28 days each, and took 

 account of the milk given only during the last 21 days of each 

 period. We had to relinquish taking the specific gravities alto- 

 gether, as our time was pretty well taken up otherwise. The 



