7O FEEDING FARM ANIMALS 



serious in breeding than in feeding animals, more particu- 

 larly during the period of finishing. With animals, there- 

 fore, that are being reared or kept for breeding, it is doubly 

 important that these mistakes shall be avoided. 



Development and ripeness. When animals approach 

 the ripening period, the capacity to make gains gradually 

 decreases, and if kept up for a period sufficiently long, will 

 at length cease altogether. Notwithstanding, the consump- 

 tion of food will be practically the same. The feeder who 

 does not watch this point closely may thus unconsciously 

 allow what would have resulted in substantial profit, had 

 the animals been sold at the opportune time, to be greatly 

 reduced if not indeed turned into positive loss. 



Ripeness in meat making may be defined as that com- 

 pleteness of finish which puts animals in the best condition 

 to meet the needs of the market, just as ripeness in the 

 carcass after it is slaughtered means that condition of 

 increase in tenderness of muscle which best meets the taste 

 of the consumer. Fruit is ripe when it has reached the 

 maximum of fitness for the use that is to be made of it. 

 Usually, in meat production, ripeness means the same as 

 completed fattening. This may be attained at almost any 

 stage of development in some types of animals, though not 

 in all, hence it is not necessarily synonymous with com- 

 pleted maturity. 



Before maturity it can be most readily attained in ani- 

 mals of compact build and of marked meat-making ten- 

 dencies through natural inheritance. Cattle of the pro- 

 nounced dairy types cannot be so effectively ripened at an 

 early age as cattle of the pronounced beef types and the 

 same is true of bacon swine as compared with the small 

 breeds, such as the Essex and Small Yorkshire. 



The stage of development at which ripeness may be 

 reached is dependent on the character of the foods fed, the 

 manner of feeding them and the forced character of the 

 feeding. Foods highly carbonaceous hasten such ripening, 



