1 8 FEEDING FARM ANIMALS 



prosecuted. It is not the thought here to draw invidious 

 distinctions between farmers engaged in different lines of 

 work, but rather to show the greater complexity of the 

 problems of growing live stock as compared with those 

 in some other lines of farming, and consequently the 

 greater skill that must be intelligently exercised where 

 the work is to be a marked success. 



The most simple style of agriculture that can be prac- 

 ticed is that pursued in pastoral districts where those who 

 practice it lead the life of nomads. The skill called for 

 in such farming relates chiefly to the selection of pastures 

 adapted to the needs of the flock. Tilling virgin lands 

 on the one crop system is a little more complex, as it in- 

 volves the use of implements of tillage. Rotating crops 

 calls for more thought and skill, since the habits of growth 

 in these differ, and consequently the requisites to produce 

 growth differ correspondingly. When fertility wanes, 

 those who grow crops must use some kind of fertilizers. 

 The proper use of these compels thought and so leads, of 

 necessity, to higher intelligence. When live stock are in- 

 troduced, additional factors of complication come with 

 them, owing to the necessities of the animals them- 

 selves. 



The necessities of the animals in the lines of food and 

 shelter on arable farms compel diversity of a certain 

 kind to provide suitable food, the erection of buildings to 

 provide suitable shelter, preparing the foods when nec- 

 essary to make them more suitable and feeding them in 

 balance to make them more effective. The stock grower 

 who does not understand how to do all this with a fair 

 measure of efficiency is not properly equipped for his bus- 

 iness. 



Efficient equipment on the part of the stock raiser in- 

 volves a reasonable knowledge, at least, of the principles 

 that relate to the selection of animals for rearing, breed- 

 ing or feeding, of those that govern development in its 



