11 Nov., 1918] American Agriculture. 663 



the big primary markets. xVll the sheep, cattle, and pigs are brought 

 into these central slaughter-places and sent back in refrigerating cars. 

 The great advantage is that the packing companies are able to sell 

 carcasses of cattle for actually less than they pay to the fai'mers for 

 them ; this is because of the high value of the by-products. They make 

 £5 a head out of the by-products of all the cattle slaughtered in Chicago. 

 With respect to the breeds of cattle, he had found that in the United 

 States they had special types of cattle for special purposes. For beef 

 they bred the Shorthorn, Hereford, and Aberdeen Angas. When trans- 

 ported long distances the law required that they should be provided 

 with water, and cattle and sheep fed with hay, and pigs with maize. 

 Stock in America used to be sent to market at three, four, or five years; 

 but they now find it more profitable to get them to a marketable stage 

 at two years of age. Wherever you go you find Holstein cows. They 

 are milk factories. The standard ration for a 1,000-lb. cow is 35 lbs. 

 ensilage and 15 lbs. of hay, but no cow could keep up a yield of 5 gallons 

 a day, no matter how much silage and hay she got, because of the bulky 

 nature of the forage. Therefore the practice is for any cow that gives 

 over 2 gallons of milk a day to receive 1 lb. of concentrate (bran gluten, 

 or cotton seed meal, or brewer's grains) for every ^ gallon of milk. 

 Other types are the Jersey, Guernsey, and Ayrshire. With regard to 

 pigs, there are two classes — the Duroc-Jersey and Poland China — which 

 produce the largest quantity of fat, and are known as lard hogs. Less 

 common are the Berkshire, the Yorkshire, and Tamworth, which are 

 used for bacon purposes. Our American cousins know how to produce 

 cheap pork. They regard a pig as essentially a grazing animal that 

 will make the most economic gain when he is given good pasture, such 

 as clover or lucerne and grain. They believe in feeding him, and the 

 pig is allowed to take as much grain and tankage, or meal scrap, which 

 is a by-product of the meat factory, as he will eat. The feed is placed 

 in an automatic feeder, similar in principle to those used in poultry 

 runs. The American says he can trust the pig's appetite. He won't 

 gorge himself if he is placed in a rape or lucerne paddock and supplied 

 with a self-feeder containing maize and tankage. Tankage and grain 

 (maize or barley) is the most economical diet, especially if used 

 as supplementary to lucerne grazing, and results in production of pork 

 at a minimum cost. During the early stages the pig is allowed plenty 

 of exercise and pasture. The low temperature in winter and the un- 

 certainty of the rains in summer in the western plains make wheat 

 growing more hazardous than in Australia. American farmers did not 

 give him the impression of cultivating their land as wellas the average 

 Wimmera farmer. They plough deeply, but the soil is of a different 

 character from that of the Wimmera plains. They are, however, very 

 systematic in their crop rotation. Grain sorghum, one of the best 

 drought-resisting crops, of which millions of acres are sown annually 

 in the United States of America, is cultivated in large areas. 



As a result of 152 experiments conducted by the United States Ofiicer 

 on Irrigation Investigation, it had been found that in the western 

 States of America 15 to 20 inches of irrigation water, in addition to an 

 average rainfall of 10 inches, was necessary to get profitable crops of 

 sugar beet. In the Maffra district, of Victoria, where the infant sugar 

 beet industry is being developed, the rainfall is too uncertain to make 



