Prickly Pear as a Stock Food. 849 



nutritive ratio, that is to say, the ratio of muscle-forming- to heat- 

 giving- constituents was found to be 1 to 18. This is too wide for 

 milch cows, which need a ratio of about 1 to 6, and it was, therefore, 

 sugg-ested that the prickly pear should be balanced by other food, for 

 example in such a ration as the following : — 



Prickly pear, 40 lb. ; wheat bran, 10 lb. ; maize stover, 12 lb. 



Another ralion suggested was: Prickly pear, 60 lb.; brewers' 

 grains, 14 lb. ; cotton seed meal, 1 lb. 



This would probably need a little more widening by the addition 

 of coarse, dry fodder. 



Yet another ration was suggested by Dr. R. F. Hare, namely: — 

 Prickly pear, 50 lb. ; wheat bran, 10 lb. ; lucerne, 10 lb. 



As an emergency farm crop for use in periods of drouglit. and of 

 value in dairy farming, the planting of prickly pear has been 

 recommended in the United States both on account of the hardiness 

 of the spiny plants and the small amount of handling which they 

 need, as well as for the other advantages possessed by such a crop, 

 namely, its practical immunity from injury by wild animals, and the 

 absence of any need for fencing it. 



As indicated above, dried prickly pear contains more nuliiment 

 than when fresh, and in some parts of India the dried plant is 

 moistened with salt and fed to cattle. Proposals have been made 

 in India for the importation of dried prickly pear leaves into other 

 provinces ; in South Africa for the manufacture, under patent, of 

 dry fodder balls ; in Australia for the preparation of a finely-ground, 

 sun-dried material. In none of these cases is there any record of the 

 actual adoption of the proposals ; this may be due partly to the extra 

 cost of preparation and parily to doubts regarding the feeding value 

 of the materials. 



Various attempts have been made in India to use unmixed prickly 

 pear as an ensilage, but not with very much success. More satisfac- 

 tory results were achieved by alternating layers of prickly pear and 

 maize or sorghum. In South Africa the experience has been similar; 

 the prickly pear ensilage could not be used alone, and grass or linseed 

 meal had to be fed along" with it. In Queensland it was found that 

 alternate layers of prickly pear and maize made an excellent ensilage. 



There are objections on the part of many to the use of prickly 

 pear as fodder. When fed alone the fibre tends to form balls in the 

 digestive canal. Many believe that the prickly pear causes general 

 debility and purging, and, furthermore, the animals by passing the 

 seed broadcast soon infest large tracts of countiy. Evidence was 

 given before more than one Select Committee of the Cape House of 

 Assembly to the effect that cattle are frequently so scoured out by 

 prickly pear that death results, and that the small spines of the fruit 

 cause inflammation of the mouth, gullet, and even stomach, until the 

 whole internal lining of the digestive organs becomes a mass of 

 thickened and inflamed mucous membrane. 



The small spines, too, often get into the animals' eyes and blind 

 them. Although cattle, sheep, and goats take to prickly pear leaves 

 which have been deprived of their spines by singeing, scouring is 

 apt to occur in such cases as well, but the tendency may be lessened by 

 giving the stock coarse feed or dried grass. 



The spiny character of the leaves naturally gives rise to a great 

 deal of trouble, and in the United States the most common practice is 



