86 THE CATTLE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 



altogether wrong in principle, and greatly prefer to give a mild 

 aperient in some warm gruel. For many years we adopted this, 

 plan, and gave, about three or four hours after calving, a dose 

 consisting of from |lb. to lib. of salts, l|oz. to 2oz. sulphur, and 

 a l^oz. of powdered ginger. In the case of very heavy milkers,, 

 and where the secretion commences some time before the cow 

 is due to calve, it is a good plan to milk the cow once a day^ 

 commencing about ten days or a fortnight before. 



Supposing our cow well over calving, and the calf removed 

 after a week or ten days, the cow will now require good 

 feeding, and on arable or mixed farms we should recommend a 

 variety of material, such as hay and straw chaff, with a small 

 quantity of pulped roots, just sufficient to moisten the mass 

 some 121b. or 151b. daily would do well. Swedish turnips are 

 generally objected to, as influencing the flavour of milk, but if 

 the heads are cut off close to the root this objection will seldom^ 

 be found valid, in any case the quantity mentioned would 

 hardly have any effect ; at any rate it will be worth trying when 

 roots are plentiful. We want in addition some cheap concen- 

 trated food or mixture of foods. Palm-nut meal or cocoa- 

 nut cake, especially rich in butter-making ingredients, have 

 |>roved valuable. A mixture of the two would not be amiss.. 

 Cocoa-nut cake we have used with advantage in conjunction 

 with cotton cake, the yield of milk and butter being maintained 

 equally as well as upon any other kind of food. The butter was 

 particularly delicious in flavour. Brewers' grains, when cheaj), 

 are principally valuable as removing the dry character of straw 

 chaff. Bran is another fine milk food, especially when used in- 

 conjunction with maize, rice meal, or any foods rich in fat 

 formers. It is, moreover, an extremely cheap food at 4Z. 10s. a 

 ton. Maize meal again is most valuable, and should be pur- 

 chased when maize is cheap (it has frequently been lower than 

 4?. 10s. a ton). It is better used in a ration rich in nitrogen, 

 such as cotton cake, bean or pea meal, although compared with 

 cotton seed meal. Professor Armsby, an American authority of 

 the highest eminence, has shown, by a lengthened experiment,, 

 that it can hold its own. Rice meal is another valuable food 

 when it can be obtained pure. It is, however, being so rich in 

 starch, better adapted for a mixed ration, and for a change.. 



