74 LIVESTOCK ON THE FARM 



mcnt of food and waste through the digestive tract. This, 

 however, is not the only principle upon which a laxative 

 works. The animal body is built like a compound machine. 

 It is made to handle a certain amount of protein, carbohy- 

 drates, fat, mineral matter and also water. When it is fed the 

 amounts of each of these substances that it can handle to the 

 best advantage it is said to have a balanced ration. The 

 amounts range, in order of quantity, as follows: water, 

 carbohydrate, protein, fat, and mineral matter. Now then, if 

 the machine is fed more of anyone of these substances than it 

 can make use of, the material must be thrown off. It is waste 

 matter and must be expelled from the body. Thus it is that 

 if one wants to cause a movement of the bowels a dose of salts 

 or oil is used. That simply means that more of these sub- 

 stances is introduced into the machine (digestion and metabo- 

 lism) than can be taken care of and the material is dis- 

 charged. On the same principle, an overdose of protein will 

 bring on scours. 



It is a well-known fact among farmers that when the car- 

 cass of an animal is left in the hog lot for the hogs to consume 

 at will, it will cause the hogs to scour. This is caused by an 

 oversupply of protein in the lean meat. The scouring may 

 also be caused by the fat in the carcass. While these sub- 

 stances are good feeds if properly used they become harmful 

 if improperly used. 



Use of Fat. It is a well-known fact that children do not 

 like fat as well as grown-up people. That is, young folks 

 cannot use as large a proportion of fat in their feed as can 

 grown-ups. This is true because growing children need more 

 protein while grown-ups, having ceased to grow, do not need 

 so much protein and can make use of a larger proportion of the 

 energy-, heat- and fat-forming substances such as fat and 

 carbohydrate. It is also known that the natural and best feed 

 for all young animals, including children, is milk which is a 

 protein feed. It is also rich in fat. 



One of the important considerations in the feeding of 

 calves appears here. When a change is made from whole 

 milk to skim milk the fat content of the ration is reduced. 

 Good feeding requires that when the butterfat is taken out 



