FARMERS' INSTITUTES. 385 



Messrs. Lawes and Gilbert. Without giving the full table in all its parts, I 

 will say that the food consumed was oil-cake or corn, clover-hay-chaff and 

 Swedes turnips to the average amount of 531 pounds per head per week ; also 

 133 pounds litter per head per week were used. There would then be a total of 

 6G4 250unds food consumed and litter. The manure and litter weighed fresh 

 575 pounds. The dry substance in this food was 276 pounds; in the manure, 

 15G pounds ; of this there was lOGf pounds dry substance of litter, giving a gain 

 of nearly 50 pounds of dry substance in manure. The summary is this : 27G 

 pounds dry substance of food and litter yield in manure, composed of excrement 

 and litter, 15G pounds, or 5G^ per cent of the original amount fed and used ; 

 43^ per cent was therefore used by the animal to lay on flesh and carry on the 

 animal machinery of the system, respiration, etc. These experiments covered 

 a period of eight weeks, and included the feeding of 44 animals of a mean 

 weight of 1,470 pounds. 



According to the mean of these experiments there would be required to be fed 

 to produce one ton (3,240 pounds) of manure 168 pounds of cake or corn, 431 

 pounds clover-hay-chaff, and 1,469 pounds swedes, or 2,068 pounds of food, 

 besides 518 pounds of litter, making a total of 2,586 pounds food and litter. This 

 contained, according to previous estimates, 1,075 pounds of dry substance, and 

 the manure 608 pounds. This shows that more than half of the food and straw 

 used with stock appears in the manure heap, and as farmers generally make no 

 account of this, if they have fed beeves or other stock, and reckon their feed 

 and only reckon their cash receipts, they have not taken into account the fact 

 that over 50 per cent of the amount fed is ready to be added to the field to aid 

 in making future crops. Although a little foreign to the subject at this Junc- 

 ture, the result of these experiments in feeding are summed up as follows, other 

 experiments having been performed with sheep and pigs : 



1. In proportion to their live weight, sheep consume about Ij and pigs 2 J 

 times as much dry substance of food as oxen. 



2. Oxen should yield about one per cent, sheep about IJ per cent and pigs 5 

 or 6 per cent of their weight increase if liberally fed. 



3. To produce 1 pound of increase, oxen require 12 to 13 pounds of the dry 

 substance of food, sheep 9 pounds, and pigs 4 to 5 pounds, 



I have already referred to the difference in the value of the manure from 

 young and poorly fed animals and those more mature and highly fed. Farm- 

 ers in the Old World recognize the fact and hence expend large amounts annu- 

 ally for rich and concentrated cattle food, such as rape-cake, oil-cake, and 

 cotton seed cake, both decorticated and undecorticated. They have the benefit 

 of their practical experience and also of the experiments of such men as Dr. J. 

 B. Lawes and Dr. Augustus Voelcker in regard to the money value of food and 

 its residue as manure. 



Most persons are aware that the active principles in manure are nitrogen con- 

 tained in the form of ammonia, or some salt of ammonia, potash in some of its 

 combinations, and phosphoric acid in some combination, probably as phosphate 

 of lime. Prof. Lawes took various kinds of food and from analysis found how 

 much nitrogen, potash, and phosphoric acid they contained in the albuminous 

 compounds and mineral matter as found in the ash. Then after feeding, anal- 

 yzed the excrements to find the amount of these substances voided. The ani- 

 mals were all carefully weighed and the increase noted. In this way, although 

 having a very complex problem to solve, tabulated statements are made out of 

 the results of several such experiments on cattle, sheep and hogs. The averages 



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