172 AGRICULTURE OF MAINE. 



ago, yet it has as much potency as strychnine has today. If 

 you were suffering from a nervous disease the physician would 

 give you some of that principle found in the oat. Wheat bran 

 is certainly too expensive to buy at $30 for the protein, but it 

 is not too expensive to buy to get some of the ash or the bone 

 that is necessary to grow the calf. There is no combination of 

 the concentrated foods that can be made that is equal to oats 

 or wheat bran for this purpose. 



Ques. Would you grind the oats? 



Ans. Not necessarily for the calf. For the cow I should. 



When our fathers used to feed the home grown foods, the 

 oat^, peas and wheat bran from the mill, we did not hear any- 

 thing about a lot of troubles that we have today. Here in 

 Maine with the clover and oats and peas that you can raise upon 

 your own farms you need not buy half the cottonseed meal you 

 are buying today. With these protein foods and the corn and 

 succulent food which you can raise, it is not necessary to buy 

 as it is in New York. We are too much in the habit of buying 

 these foods because we can see a little more milk in the milk 

 pail. Sometimes for the love of milk we are weakening the 

 animal. Of course oats and wheat bran are too expensive to 

 feed largely but in growing your calves you need some of them. 

 I am sort of a go-between. Here is the farmer on one side and 

 the scientist on the other side. The scientific principles are all 

 right, but when the farmer applies them he frequently makes 

 mistakes and I have to step in between and cure the cow. I 

 would feed some cottonseed meal if I had some succulent food 

 to feed with it, but let that be the small purchase and raise all 

 you can. I do not think I would make the distinction that has 

 been made, however, between the linseed and the cottonseed. 

 The cottonseed is the cheapest source of protein, but it can be 

 fed to only one animal that we have on the farm, and that is the 

 cow. It is not as palatable or digestible as the linseed and it is 

 a question whether these points do not more than counterbalance 

 what is gained in the protein. Put them price for price today 

 and on my farm give me linseed. 



Ques. Do you think it will pay to raise calves ? I have been 

 told that a calf at six weeks old will bring more than at one year 

 old. 



