140 agricui^ture; of maine. 



four v/eeks before she is ready to calve, commence to feed so 

 as to get her in shape. If she is on grass, in June, she will 

 be naturally in good condition; but we only have a month or 

 two of this good pasture feed, and then we must supplement it 

 from the barn. And as the cow approaches the time of calving, 

 as the udder commences to enlarge, we would leave out the 

 fever-producing foods. If we had been feeding corn meal we 

 would gradually leave that out. We generally leave it out en- 

 tirely the last week or ten days before calving. I would like 

 to say here that if you have plenty of ground oats you will not 

 have to bother with any other grain ration, because it is bulky, 

 it has the ash, it supplies the food nutrients. Oats are about 

 as near to a full ration, for the dairy cow or any other animal, 

 as possible. We like to feed bran mashes occasionally as she 

 approaches calving, and silage if we have it. I like to give her 

 a little additional food, also, in the form of roots — turnips or 

 mangels, because they are naturally laxative and keep her in 

 good condition. Aside from the nutritive value in the extra 

 foods you are giving to the cow, there is something else which 

 you do not realize. You are getting into sympathy with the 

 cow and the cow is getting into sympathy with you and you 

 are being more careful than you would be if you were simply 

 letting her go along in the regular channels of feeding. The 

 cow likes sympathy, and I think if you will study your animals 

 at that time you will be able to get considerably more out of 

 them. 



Again, after the cow has calved how shall we feed her? 

 That is a question that has come to many of us, and I want to 

 deal with it from an economical standpoint because in the feed- 

 ing of the cow at this time lies a large portion of our success. 

 We may have fed her carefully as a dry cow, but if we think 

 our work is all done then we will make a mistake. Just after 

 the cow has calved I like to feed her almost identically the 

 same as she has been fed previous to calving. The first thing 

 Vv'e do is to give her a drink of warm water, and then give her 

 bran mashes, one or two a day, at the beginning. Give her 

 roots, to keep her in a good natural laxative condition. As 

 soon as the parturition fever has left the cow, we commence 

 to feed her towards milk production. It may be the first day, 

 it may be the second day or it may be the third day after she 



