224 TRANSACTIONS OF THE AMERICAN INSTITUTE. 



Dr. Snodgrass — They do probably aid digestion, because the 

 corn meal is too concentrated, and needs a mixture of some coarser 

 substance, like col) meal. 



Mr. H. P. Smith — The farmers in our section of country have 

 come to the conclusion that corn meal is not too concentrated for 

 feeding beef cattle. I grind corn and cobs to feed milch cows, to 

 increase the quantity of milk for sale, but the beef feeders are 

 most successful on the highest concentrated food; and they esteem 

 corn meal, ground fine and fed fresh from the mill with good clean 

 hay, the best substance known for fattening cattle. They do not 

 think corn coljs of any value for such purposes. 



Mr. William Lawton thought they must be nuitritious, because 

 he had often seen his cows pick them up and eat them. 



Dr. Sylvester is convinced of their being nutritious, l^ecause 

 his father always fed weak young lambs upon corn col) tea to 

 revive them. For a milk dairy he thoiight them very valual^le, 

 where quantity of milk was an object, though he believes the 

 richest milk comes from corn meal to cut hay. He also recom- 

 mends buckwheat highly for cow feed. 



Mr. Solon Eol>inson — I believe, from what I have observed in my 

 own case and that of others, that the benefits to the lambs would 

 have been just as great from the use of hot water without cobs as 

 with. I believe, too, that it has been pretty w^ell settled, by a 

 great many practical experiments, that corn cobs are less nutri- 

 tious than rye straw and other similar woody fiber. The twigs of 

 basswood, maple, ash, and several other forest trees, are decidedly 

 more valuable for cattle feed than cobs. Whenever a farmer has 

 settled in his own mind that it will pay to grind basswood rails 

 to mix with his corn meal, he may be morally certain that it will 

 pay to grind corn cobs. Whenever wood is worth four or five 

 dollars a cord, there is no purpose to which cobs can be so profita- 

 bly applied as for fuel. As they contain more potash than any 

 kind of firewood, the ashes should be carefully saved for the leach 

 tub, or to apply to the growing corn, for which there is no better 

 manure. The statement of Mr. Smith about the Westfield (Mass.) 

 cattle feeders, if not conclusive, is valuable, because they are 

 widely known as a class of highly intelligent farmers, who feed 

 bullocks for a profit, and succeed in making some of the best sold 

 in the New York or Boston market; as they have tested the value 

 of cob meal, and find that it will not pay to grind cobs, even 



