380 SWINE IN AMERICA 



disease, a fact which is well known to all observant and 

 careful feeders, but too little appreciated by the general 

 run of farmers. This is due to its high content of those 

 elements of the food which develop fat and heat, and 

 lack of those necessary for the development of flesh and 

 blood, upon which the proper growth of the animal de- 

 pends. Cottonseed meal, on the contrary, contains a 

 great excess of these latter elements and a deficiency of 

 those starchy constituents which are so much in excess 

 in corn. Independent of any actual poison present in 

 cottonseed meal, its exclusive or excessive use in hog- 

 feeding would doubtless also result in unthrift and dis- 

 ease. But it supplies the nitrogenous or flesh-forming 

 elements in the cheapest concentrated form in which it 

 can be bought. For these reasons cottonseed meal and 

 corn should supplement each other and be fed together." 



MUST BE USED CAUTIOUSLY 



The experiments at the Arkansas station show that the 

 question of poison is one of amount of feed to a con- 

 siderable extent, and that ''the toxic allowance is deter- 

 mined by the amount per day rather than by the absolute 

 amount fed. Thirty pounds fed in 30 days may cause 

 fatal poisoning, while amounts up to 150 pounds, in 

 proper daily allowance, have been fed without harmful 

 effects." This would suggest that, in sufficiently moder- 

 ate quantity, and given with due discretion, cottonseed 

 meal or cottonseed, might be fed with corn to hogs with- 

 out danger. The "danger limit" has, in fact, been esti- 

 mated by Prof. R. R. Dinwiddie of the Arkansas station. 

 although he says (Bulletin No. 85) : "According to our 



