282 MANUAL OF AGRICULTUKE. 



the produce of the large number of breeding animals kept being 

 sold off as ''store" cattle and sheep for fattening in more 

 favoured districts. In point of fact, since the increased demand 

 for prime '' butcher meat," down through all ranks of the com- 

 munity, has so particularly raised the price of the article, the 

 great end of all British agriculture is becoming more and more 

 exclusively the rearing and feeding of live stock. 



The peculiarities of the digestive economy in ruminants, ren- 

 dering juicy and bulky food, like our different grasses, most 

 appropriate to their use, they cannot be reared and fattened on 

 dry concentrated food alone, without incurring the risk of dis- 

 ease. Durino- winter and the non-veoetative months our various 



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■green and root crops form admirable substitutes for grasses. 

 Concentrated feeding stuffs added to the natural bulky food, 

 wdiilst they do not impair the digestive functions, supply the 

 absorbents with materials rich in the ses^eral proximate com- 

 pounds for maintaining and multiplying the animal tissues. 

 As we have seen by the foregoing analysis, grasses and clovers 

 are much more nutritious than equal weights of turnips ; wdiere- 

 fore, stock which is being fattened on grass does not, as a rule, 

 receive concentrated feeding stuff in addition, though under the 

 high pressure system, the contrary practice is beginning to 

 obtain. Animals being winter fed, however, receive, as a matter 

 of course, artificial food in addition to the straw and tur- 

 nips ; and their quickly increasing weight is the justification. 

 Stuffs, rich in albuminous proximate compounds, are the most 

 valuable, by reason of their affording the necessary flesh-forming 

 material, and at the same time increasing the manurial value of 

 the excreta ; and their value reaches a maximum by the daily 

 proportionate admixture of oleaginous and respiratory bodies. 

 Of grains most used are ground barley, beans, and Indian corn ; 

 wheat and oats are not often given to pasturing stock, though the 

 last is often put before store cattle. Bran, malt dust, and the 

 refuse malt and liquids of breweries and distilleries, are also 

 made use of. Of the many waste substances of the manufactory, 

 which chemical knowledge has made available for stock feeding, 

 the most important are the solid cakes or tablets, the residuum 

 of the oil-extracting process by pressure from linseed, rape 

 seed, cotton seed, &c. As these contain some of the oil, and 

 all the other proximate constituents in the composition of the 

 seed, they constitute a most invaluable concentrated feeding stuff. 

 It ought not to be lost sight of, that however high their value, as 

 containing such constituents may be, it must needs be regulated 

 by their properties of easy digestion, otherwise such constituents 

 will pass through the alimentary canal but little acted upon. 

 Digestibility accordingly, especially in the case of fibrous sub- 

 stances, is greatly promoted by subjecting feeding stuffs to steam- 

 ing, or such like concoction, or to fermentation. 



