g6 BEAN CULTURE 



Remarking on this table Professor Stone* says it 

 will be observed that bean straw contains three 

 times as much protein as oat straw ; three times as 

 much as corn and one-third more than timothy hay. 

 As regards the carbohydrates and the total diges- 

 tible nutrients it is only slightly inferior to timothy 

 hay. Bean straw when fed directly has a tendency 

 to produce looseness of the bowels. For this reason 

 it should not be made the exclusive diet, but fed in 

 connection with foods that will correct this ten- 

 dency. 



Value for live stock. — Prof. C S Plumb pub- 

 lishes** some interesting facts on waste beans as a 

 stock food. He says : "According to the experience of 

 a number of farmers in Michigan, waste beans not 

 suitable for market are a satisfactory feeding stuff 

 for farm animals. The opinion is generally held by 

 local breeder, that beans cannot be given to all 

 classes of stock. A mixture of corn, oats, and 

 ground beans in the relation of 2.1 respectively, 

 give good results with horses, cattle, sheep and 

 pigs. The beans are fed cooked to pigs, but to 

 other classes of stock dry, ground or unground, as 

 the feeder sees fit. They are usually ground for 

 cattle. When fed with care, both the beans and 

 the fodder will give excellent results^ though the 

 feeder must remember that it is a laxative food. 



Barring cull beans, the common sorts of field and 

 garden beans are seldom fed milch cows in this 

 country. In Scotland, horse beans were found to 

 make a good quality of butter. In Massachusetts, 

 soy bean meal made more and richer milk and but- 

 ter of better color than cottonseed meal. However, 



•N T, Cornell Bui 210. ♦'Breeder's Gazette, p 669, 1903. 



