230 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



An article of fodder which formerly was considered as 

 something of a definite individual character was shown to 

 contain more or less varying proportions of starch, fat, gum, 

 cellular matter, salines, and nitrogenous substances. It was 

 also noticed, in the case of the same article, that . when 

 raised upon a different kind of soil, or under different modes 

 of cultivation and fertilization, its previously mentioned prin- 

 cipal proximate constituents differed more or less in regard 

 to their absolute as well as to their relative quantities. 

 Neither two kinds of plants, nor parts of plants, were found 

 alike in their composition. 



In feeding the same kind of fodder, it soon became appar- 

 ent that its particular stage of growth controlled to a 

 considerable extent its degree of digestibility, and thus its 

 feeding-value : it was found that the same kind of plant- 

 constituents, as nitrogenous matter, fat, &c, behaved, under 

 similar conditions, quite differently, in that direction, in case 

 of different plants ; for instance, the nitrogenous matter in 

 the case of oats proved to be digestible only at from 58 to 

 81.2 per cent ; in the case of wheat-bran, from 61.6 to 93.5 

 per cent ; and, in the case of beans, from 80 to 100 per cent ; 

 and similar relations were noticed in regard to non-nitro- 

 genous matter, fat, and cellular substance. The particular 

 admixture even, which a fodder substance may receive to 

 make up the diet of the animal, has been noticed quite fre- 

 quently to affect the rate of the digestibility of one or more 

 of its constituents. 



These and similar results, once duly appreciated, rendered 

 it quite certain that no one plant alone could furnish a -proper 

 standard for a general fodder valuation ; nor that one definite 

 numerical expression could correctly state the relative or abso- 

 lute feeding-value of any kind of fodder. Twenty years of 

 exact experimental observation (from 1840 to 1860) were 

 required to prove to the majority of intelligent agriculturists 

 of Europe that their elaborated and popular hay-value tables 

 were based on an erroneous supposition. The speedy gen- 

 eral recognition of this view was largely due to the elabo- 

 rated and skilfully conducted feeding experiments carried 

 on by Henneberg and Stohman at the Agricultural Experi- 

 ment Station Weende, near Gottingen, Germany. Their 

 reports, entitled "Contribution to the Introduction of a 



