CATTLE-FEEDING EXPERIMENTS 225 



1911-12 experiments of the Edinburgh College, Mr 

 Bruce's report shows that when Bombay cotton cake 

 (4 Ibs. per head per day) was fed along with the same 

 weight of linseed cake, or 4f Ibs. wheat bran per head 

 per day, in addition to 90 Ibs. swedes and 12 Ibs. oat 

 straw, satisfactory results were obtained in both cases. 

 The " linseed-cake mixture" of concentrates gave a com- 

 position of A 24 O 7i F 15> and an average increase in live 

 weight of 2-27 Ibs. per head per day; while the "bran 

 mixture " had a composition of A 17 O 4 F 15 , and yielded 

 an average increase of 2-02 Ibs. per head per day. 



The " bran mixture " actually left more profit, but 

 the great point to remember when using concentrates 

 high in fibre for fattening animals, is that the ration 

 should be made more laxative in one or more of the 

 following ways : 



(a) Substituting hay for straw (more especially in 



England). 



(b) Increasing the allowance of roots. 



(<:) Including concentrates which have a laxative 

 tendency. 



The success of both the above rations was due in 

 one case to including linseed cake, and in the other 

 bran, both of which have laxative properties. Anyhow, 

 cocoa-nut cake and Bombay cotton cake were fed in 

 the same experiment, and the mixture gave a composi- 

 tion of A 20 O 7i F 16 3; but the daily live weight increase 

 obtained was not so high (1-91 Ibs.), very probably due 

 to the mixture being richer in fibre and of a slightly 

 more " binding nature." 



The general rule in fattening cattle is that the 



P 



