EXPERIMENT STATION BULLETINS. 191 



CULL BEANS AS A FOOD FOR SWINE. 



R. S. SHAW AND A. C. ANDERSON. 

 The plans of this experiment were executed and material prepared for publication by Mr. Anderson. 



Bulletin No. 243. 



The State of Michigan has long been noted for the magnitude and 

 superiority of its bean crop. The yearly acreage ranges between 150,000 

 and 350,000 acres, with a total production of between 1,500,000 and 

 5,000,000 bushels per annum. 



While the peculiarities of the season and weather conditions at har- 

 vest have much to do with the quality of the crop, it is probably safe 

 to estimate that at least 5 per cent, and in exceptional years as high 

 as 10 per cent, fall into the class known as cull or damaged beans. 

 It is also reported, by persons engaged in the business, that probably 

 about one-half of the culls are used for feeding purposes. 



If this be true there must then be available for feeding approximately 

 100,000 bushels of cull beans from an average crop; while for years 

 of exceptionally large acreage or yield, or exceptionally unfavorable 

 weather the number of bushels used for feeding purposes must be far 

 in excess of that amount. 



A large number of inquiries come to this station relative to the feed- 

 ing value of cull beans, the different farm animals to which they may 

 be fed, the gains which may be expected from their use, and the dif- 

 ferent methods of using them, to convert this important and cheap by- 

 product into a marketable article. 



Mixed with other grains, cull beans may be fed to sheep, and large 

 quantities are used in this state for this purpose each year; it is re- 

 ported that they are used as a food for dairy cows ; they are also fed to 

 swine, and it is as a swine food that they are to be considered in this 

 bulletin. 



While this work is undertaken in an effort to furnish information to 

 a large number of inquiring residents of this state, it is not desired 

 to advocate the extensive use of beans as a swine food, especially in 

 the fattening or finishing period. Pork from hogs which have been 

 fattened quite largely on beans is generally soft and lacking in quality. 

 If a considerable portion of the pork produced in the state were of 

 this kind it would lower prices and work serious harm to the swine in- 

 dustry. 



It is generally conceded that bean-fed hogs store up a fat having a 

 lower melting point, and consequently a softer fat, than hogs fed upon 

 many other feeds; and that a considerable portion of the element called 

 quality in pork is dependent upon the melting point or character of 

 the fat stored up. In the case of mutton finished upon beans no such 

 criticism has been made, probably because there is relatively less fat 

 in the carcass of the sheep, and its character is not so essential to the 

 quality of the meat as in the case of the pig. 



A still further reason for conducting the experiments here reported 



