DIGESTION AND WINTER FEEDING. 49 



for both for three months ; and then I take one calf off and 

 put it on another cow, and let the other calf have all the 

 milk that the wet-nurse will give. 



Question. At what age would you wean a calf? 



Mr. BowDiTCH. If I had the milk to spare, I would keep 

 him on a wet-nurse as long as he wanted it. I had a pet 

 bull-calf that had his belly full of skim-milk until he was 

 thirteen or fourteen months old, and it seemed to do him 

 good. 



Mr. Sessions. New milk would seem to be the best 

 thing that we can find to raise a calf on ; but the question is, 

 Can we afford to give it to him ? It is well known that the 

 majority of the calves of Massachusetts are ordinary cattle, 

 that, at the age of a year, can be bought in the market for 

 fifteen dollars. You can buy a thousand of yearling heifers 

 at that price ; and of course, the cattle of Massachusetts, as a 

 whole, are made up of such stock. They are not thorough- 

 breds. You may say they ought to be worth more ; but will 

 any man say that people who farm for a living can raise 

 calves on new milk, and sell them at that price and make a 

 living? The men who make butter must have the cream 

 from their milk to buy their wheat-flour, to buy their wives 

 and daughters clothing ; and they cannot afford to give their 

 calves new milk. They would cost more at five or six 

 months old than they would bring when they came in as 

 cows. 



Mr. BowDiTCH. What do you consider the value of sweet 

 skim-milk for feeding purposes, — for pigs, for instance ? 



Mr. Sessions. I am not able to say. We use it for the 

 production of calves to the best of our ability. I have never 

 made an estimate of its value. We have no other way of 

 using it, only to feed it out. 



Mr. Taft. Mr. Sessions lives up in the hills, ten miles 

 from Springfield, in Hampden County. 



Mr. Slade. I presume no one knows better than Mr. 

 Bowditch what skim-milk is worth ; but the only way to get 

 at that sort of thing is to put it down in dollars and cents. 



Mr. Bowditch. I will take it at a cent a quart. How 

 many months would you give your calf skim-milk ? 



Mr. Sessions. Just as long as I have the milk to spare. 



Mr. Bowditch. You would feed it eight months, wouldn't 

 you? 



