492 Missouri Agricultural Report. 



We would conclude from a study of this experiment that 

 broken ear corn is most efficient for fattening lambs as com- 

 pared to shelled and ground corn. This holds true both for 

 the alfalfa as well as the silage rations. Seven cents greater 

 profit per lamb was secured when shelled corn was fed as com- 

 pared to broken ear on alfalfa, but ten cents more was made 

 with broken ear corn as compared with' shelled corn on silage; 

 at any rate, the showing is in favor of broken corn, because if 

 one even got 7 cents more per lamb he would hardly go to the 

 trouble of shelling the corn at a cost of 2 cents a bushel. It 

 usually costs more than 2 cents a bushel to shell corn. This is 

 especially true under average farm conditions. Of course, 

 there are conditions under which corn can be shelled for a less 

 figure; the actual cost must be taken into consideration when 

 solving local problems. 



Ground corn with alfalfa gave somewhat cheaper gains 

 than either the broken or shelled corn, but the lambs shrank 

 heavily going to market so as to reduce the profits per lamb. 

 We presume that the final weight on this lot at home was for 

 some unknown reason abnormally high, even though an average 

 of three individual weights on every lamb was taken in order 

 to compute the average final weight. There is a slight indica- 

 tion, however, that the ground corn fed lambs will shrink more 

 than those fed broken corn or whole ear. 



The "ground corn" lot, however, showed up so unfavorably 

 in the 1913-14 feeding trial that it is quite evident that the 

 simpler preparations excel it. 



The "ground corn with corn silage" lot made the least 

 profit of the three preparations tried, a still further evidence 

 that the ground corn is not the most economic preparation. 



GENERAL SUMMARY. 



I. A combination of preparations, happily manipulated 

 by the skilled feeder, should be more efficient than a single 

 preparation taken through the entire period. To illustrate, 

 one can start the lambs out on whole ear corn, change to broken, 

 and finally finish on a mixture of broken and ground, or he 

 could start out on corn and cob meal and finish largely on corn 

 meal. The general aim should be to "keep the feed a bit better 

 than the lambs." 



II. Whole and broken corn of the single continuous 



